


寔命不同 (our lot is not like theirs)

by bookingref, Naladot



Category: EXO (Band), K-pop, Miss A, Wonder Girls
Genre: Alternate Universe, Corruption, Drama, Dysfunctional Family, Eventual Romance, F/M, Family, Friendship, Gen, Intrigue, Step-Sibling Incest, Suspense, Wealth
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-15
Updated: 2015-07-17
Packaged: 2018-03-30 16:38:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 96,969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3943930
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookingref/pseuds/bookingref, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Naladot/pseuds/Naladot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The lives of China’s richest children are shrouded in mystery. With money to burn, they inevitably go rogue—abandoning morality for the law of wealth, and drowning their sorrows in luxury cars and designer goods and too much alcohol and too much sex.</p><p>But when Wang Feifei realizes the corruption going on at the highest levels of society—and Lu Han’s father is the main culprit—a choice is on the line. She can either turn a blind eye to the sins of their parents, or she can bring their whole world down in flames.</p><p>A multi-chaptered fic ft. kpop’s China-Line + EXO members + Ahn Sohee as Minseok’s sister.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: The characters in this story do not in any way represent the real people they are based off of.

  
**Prologue**

  
_I can still picture us all on that night, gathered together in a massive California mansion for Lu Han’s birthday party. It was the first and last time we were all under one roof, the children of China and Korea’s elite, heir apparents to that elusive top one percent. Money was a drug we had been raised on, and so we were addicted, searching for our fix of wealth anywhere we could find it. This is how I remember us: hopelessly broken, desperately wild, utterly reprehensible. We had been raised to blur the lines between right and wrong—and those lines are drawn less starkly than people assume. But the lines can be drawn. At some point in life, every person has to make that choice._

_My name is Wang Feifei._

_This was mine._


	2. 嘒彼小星

 

 

嘒彼小星  
_we are little stars_

 

* * *

 

 

Lu Han had known this since he was a child: that his family was somewhere high up in the pyramid which made up China as they knew it, and he had no reason to be ashamed of it. His family was meant to be perfect, the sort of model home that the Party wanted the people to see and emulate. A powerful father, a loving mother, a capable son. He was that flawless son.

But flawless sons were not supposed to have cracks in their veneers, not even when they found out their father was dirty. So that was what being powerful meant, he thought. It gave you the ability to take everything from the people who offered them, and still stay dry. He thought of the way his parents had taught him to be: pride of the Nation. It now festered at the bottom of his throat.

His father had sent him to the States when he was in high school. Lu Han now spoke more English than Mandarin, didn’t wear suits unless they were handmade by their family tailor in Italy, and owned six different cars with fancy names and colours that were stored in a private facility in California. He owned four more in Beijing. Of course. Of course all of this had to be financed by his father lining his pocket quietly. Why didn’t he see this earlier? The thing festering at the bottom of his throat wouldn’t budge. Maybe because these were all meant to be his, because he sat at the top of the food chain. It was the socialist way of life that they had created for themselves, one more capitalist than the one the Party officially abhorred. A little ivory tower Lu Han had thought himself on top of. But he was inside.

Lu Han was only here, eavesdropping outside his father’s private study about him taking more money to turn a blind eye, because his mother had recalled him back to Beijing for a birthday party for some girl that he’d never met before but could be a possible marriage candidate. The top of the pyramid never moved downwards, only up and around. He could hear his father agree to do something, probably as sordid as everything else, and then laughter. The thing rotted a bit more. Lu Han swallowed but still it remained stuck. There was a shuffling inside, and he immediately turned into the neighbouring room and shut the door. He heard the men amble out, patting themselves on the back, and the click of a lighter. His father only smoked the best Cuban cigars. The key of the bright red Ferrari he’d been gifted with for his eighteenth birthday pressed tightly into his thigh.

He waited until he could no longer hear his father, before pulling the door open slowly and walking back downstairs. His mother was waiting. The show had to go on.

 

 

* * *

 

“So has your mother decided on a child bride candidate?” He could hear Zhang Yixing laugh over the phone. Lu Han and Yixing were housemates, in one of those old grand houses that his father had transferred under his name after he’d turned nineteen. Before that they lived for a year as roommates in one of their school dormitories. Lu Han had registered secretly, and his parents didn’t find out until they made a visit. His compromise was to invite Yixing along to the family mansion that his parents wanted him to move into.

“She’s twenty, okay?” Lu Han said and rolled his eyes. It was 2 AM here so it was afternoon in the States. No wonder Yixing sounded perky. Zhang Yixing and he were so different that sometimes he wondered why they were so close. Yixing’s family was wealthy, but a step below on that pyramid he was so well acquainted with. The Zhangs were mining greats, but Yixing came from a cadet branch that managed a side company. Still made incredible money, but socially none of his friends in Beijing really cared to mingle with him. Good for Lu Han though. His friends here were asshats most of the time who found it their life’s calling to flunk out of consecutive schools. Lu Han wanted more than to just have money, he wanted to be a lawyer that had earning power that wasn’t limited to his family’s coffers. Dreams always seemed good on paper, anyhow.

“Yeah whatever. Still not legal in five million different states.” Yixing had American citizenship, like most of them did. The public didn’t know that. “Is your mom serious about arranging a marriage? I thought that stopped at least a hundred years ago.”

“Their marriage was arranged. Look at where they are now.” Lu Han said. He couldn’t help the bitterness that seeped through, but judging from Yixing’s laughter he didn’t seem to notice either. “Anyway, the girl seemed more interested in eye-fucking my cousin, so I guess that’s that.”

“Lu Yang? Yeah, I can see why she picked him over you. Guy’s a beast on steroids. My cousin’s schoolmates with him, and he says that he never misses a day at the gym. Especially not leg day.” Yixing laughed again and Lu Han followed along weakly. He didn’t care too much about his cousin, not when his parents were probably in on collecting bribes like it was Chinese New Year everyday.

Yixing rambled on a little more about Lu Yang’s gym routine while he slid off the bed and opened the doors to his balcony. The wind was cool, and he could see the swimming pool that was immaculately maintained but never much used when he wasn’t in Beijing. Lu Han let the wind blow on his face for a while more, before he realised he could smell the smog. Beijing was a city eternally smothered in air so dirty they needed air purifiers in every room. He narrowed his eyes and tried to watch out for stars. There was the Forbidden Palace in the distance, regal and shadowed in darkness, delineating the night. This was their landmark, Beijing’s gift of imperial royalty to the world. It was what made Beijing what it was, all grandeur and glitter.

But there were no stars.

 

* * *

 

Kris felt like he was suffocating in that massive house.

Three floors, and no room to breathe. His own suite and he still felt like he was living out of a hotel. His mother had made herself right at home—redecorated the whole first floor while Kris’s new stepfather was away. He’d been delighted by the changes when he came back. Kris’s new stepsister had given them a scathing once-over and then gone upstairs without a word. And his mother wondered why he still felt like an outsider with the Wangs.

He could stay elsewhere. His mother offered to get him his own apartment in a denser part of Shanghai to use when he spent his school breaks in China—it wouldn’t cost too much, she insisted, and he could get away from “that bitchy princess,” the least colorful of her names for his stepsister Feifei. But Kris wanted to be near his mother, wanted to keep getting to know his stepfather. He couldn’t miss an opportunity if it arose, and almost every day his stepfather hosted dinners for affluent friends. Feifei manipulated conversations beautifully. It was almost like art, watching her. Kris was learning every day.

But he still hated the house, no matter how many changes his mother made to make it suit her sensibilities better. So he got up and left his room, sneaking out the back entrance and wandering out to the street. A fifteen minute walk would get him to a subway stop and then he could wander Shanghai, breathe a little.

Ever since Kris was little, his mother had warned him that he’d better watch his own back, because someone else was always waiting to step over him on their way up the ladder. The first time he could remember her saying this, he was seven years old and they were living in a sorry excuse for an apartment, a place he remembered for its stained concrete walls and no heat or air conditioning. She’d tell him every day that they were getting out of that place, that his father was the reason they’d ended up poor and he’d be sorry for his cruelty some day. Kris got his good looks from his father. But his mother always warned him that if he wanted to make anything out of his life, it had better be only his looks that he inherited from his father’s side—the rest, he should get from his mother’s. She’d made him change his name to match his maternal surname, and he hadn’t seen his father in years.

He walked into a hole-in-the-wall shop, the kind of place he wasn’t supposed to be caught dead in, and bought a bottle of soda. The shopkeepers were speaking in brisk Shanghainese, which Kris couldn’t follow, and the shelves were stocked haphazardly with cheap snacks and odds and ends. This kind of shop would never exist in America, which made Kris like it better. He missed China when he was gone. But the shop was also the kind of place Kris swore he would not end up. His life was headed up from here on out. Marrying into the Wang family was a smart move on his mother’s part. If Kris played his hand carefully, he’d end up firmly in the top ranks of society, where his mother always insisted he belonged.

He left the shop and started to head for the subway, but stopped in his tracks when a car turned the corner. He twisted the bottle open carefully and watched a familiar black Porsche drive sleekly down the road. Behind the wheel he could just make out the contours of Feifei’s face, hidden behind expensive sunglasses. He would get stuck with a gorgeous stepsister. Her boyfriend was almost certainly gay. And yet they’d get married, produce the required grandson, and keep everything else mum. He couldn’t say he was surprised, but somehow it seemed like a waste, a girl like Feifei ending up with a guy who couldn’t really appreciate her. Kris hated her, but he could appreciate her.

He was surprised when the car turned right instead of heading straight toward the house. Kris took a long drink from the bottle and tried to make up his mind. He could follow her, and possibly instigate a war between the two of them. Or he could not follow her, and never know if he could have found something to use against her. It didn’t _have_ to be a war between the two of them, but Feifei had made it clear from day one that that was how she saw it. The first day Kris moved in, she’d told him, “You are not my brother, and you do not get to take what belongs to me.” Of course, Feifei thought the whole world belonged to her. Kris just wanted his own slice of the pie.

Kris decided to follow her. He hailed a taxi cab and slid into the passenger seat. “You gotta help me,” he said quickly. “I need to apologize to my girlfriend. She just made me get out of the car and then she drove off.”

The taxi driver thought that was hilarious, and happily followed Kris’s directions. Kris kept up a steady conversation with the driver about his big fight with his girlfriend, while keeping an eye on the black Porsche. Feifei drove meticulously, but fast. The taxi driver just drove fast. Kris was surprised when they kept getting farther away from the city proper, and more excited. Whatever Feifei was doing, it wasn’t part of her normal routine.

They arrived at some sort of park. Feifei drove in through the gates, but Kris told the driver to stop outside of them and paid the driver the fare.

“Good luck with your lady friend,” the driver said, laughing to himself as he gave Kris change. “Car like that, must be a girl worth keeping.” He waggled his eyebrows at Kris as he handed over the money. Kris got out of the car and turned toward the park.

“Must be,” he muttered. Then he went inside.

He could still see Feifei’s car in the distance. It pulled into a parking spot, and then Feifei got out. She carried a large container on one arm. Even from a distance Kris could see the lines of her legs in her high heels and just—he _had_ to have a hot evil stepsister.

Feifei wandered into the park and Kris picked up his pace. There were other people strolling around, but it wasn’t crowded.

By the time he had Feifei in sight again, she was entering another area of the park. Kris followed her, and it wasn’t until he’d gone through some trees that he realized where they were.

Feifei was placing flowers on a grave.

Kris didn’t move any farther. He watched Feifei take food out from the basket and put it on the grave as well. Instinctively he knew that he’d screwed up, this time—miscalculated. If Feifei saw him here, she’d be furious. He thought she almost blamed him and his mother for her mother’s death, even though they hadn’t known each other at the time. But it was still a bit odd for Feifei to be here, especially when she’d spent every day for the last few weeks in her father’s offices, occupying her vacation time with business. In the office she liked to pretend Kris didn’t exist. At home, she had less luck.

He watched her hug her arms around herself. Was she crying? He couldn’t imagine Feifei crying. Of course she would still be grieving for her mother a year and a half after her death, but Feifei had been so steadily and uniformly hateful since he moved in, that picturing her crying unsettled him. Gave too much unpleasant context to their family dinners. Where he saw his mother finally achieving happiness after so many years of suffering, Feifei only saw a woman stomping on her mother’s grave. Discerning that made Kris all the more aware that he and Feifei would be clawing at each other’s throats without stop until this vacation was over. They both had too much to fight for.

But he could recognize his opponent’s humanity. So he doubled back to the parking lot, and waited there, leaning against the hood of her car.

Some twenty minutes later Feifei emerged from the park. He saw her notice him from a distance—the half-second falter in her stride. He couldn’t make out any emotion behind her sunglasses. So he just watched her walk. Damn, if only they’d met before their parents got married.

She came close to the car and walked past him. “What are you doing here?” she asked in a flat voice.

“Thought we could use a little sibling bonding time,” he said pleasantly. Feifei unlocked the car and looked up at him. He could only see his own reflection in her sunglass lenses.

“So you followed me to my mother’s grave?”

Kris needed to quickly decide what option to take. A total lie she’d see right through. The full truth would make her furious. A half-truth might work.

“I didn’t know what it was until I was already here,” he said, searching what he could see of her face for a reaction. “When I realized, I waited here.”

She stared at him for a long moment.

“Get in.” She pointed toward the passenger side, and Kris obeyed. He had a feeling things were headed in the right direction.

He climbed into the cool, dark car and reopened his soda. When Feifei got into the driver’s seat and cranked the engine, he offered her the bottle with a quirk of a smile—more to see what she would do than anything else. She looked at him, expressionless, and then took the bottle and took a long drink. Then she handed it back, and pulled out of the spot. Kris had no idea what just happened, but _something_ had.

“Tell me something,” Feifei said. “What on earth makes you think it’s okay to follow me around?” She looked over at him and Kris shivered just a little.

Kris played with the plastic label on the coke, peeling it away from the bottle and crinkling the plastic between his fingers. “Because we’re siblings,” he said sweetly.

Feifei snorted and Kris bit back a smile.

“Give me one good reason I shouldn’t go tell my father that you have a perverted obsession with me,” Feifei said.

“If you did, I’d tell him that you had it all wrong—I was looking out for you with a sense of brotherly protection.”

“And he’s supposed to buy that?”

“You know he would.”

Feifei fell silent. Kris watched the buildings roll past the window. They were getting close to home, and he had a strong feeling she wasn’t showing all her cards. She was too quiet. Too careful. Usually he could get her anger to rise to the surface, but she was carefully controlling her words.

“I’m sure Dad didn’t miss you at the office this afternoon, anyway,” Kris said. It was a probe, and Kris watched her visibly bristle.

“I’m not an employee, Wu Yifan. I keep my own hours.”

“No, that’s true. An employee has a lot less to prove than the boss’s daughter, after all.”

She bristled again, but stayed silent. Usually that would have instigated a massive fight—so Kris still hadn’t found the source of her evasiveness. He decided to cut to the chase and see what happened.

“You’re hiding something,” he told her.

A small smile twisted across her lips. “So are you.”

He couldn’t help but laugh. Feifei was such a well-trained heiress, so gifted in the art of intrigue, that sometimes he sat back and wondered what he was playing at. But she wouldn’t win. She wasn’t like him. She’d never had to look out for herself. Never knew what it was like to scrape at the bottom of the barrel and come up empty. Never been abandoned to poverty.

“This is new,” he said. “Something has changed with you.”

She pulled the car into the garage. As the garage door went down, she pulled off her sunglasses and turned to him. In the dim light of the garage he saw that her makeup had left watery black streaks around her eyes.

“Well, then I guess you’ll just have to keep wondering.” She smiled. “As if you didn’t already think about me enough.”

 

* * *

 

Feifei picked at her noodles. This was unacceptable at the dining table, and since they were having a family dinner, even more so. Her father would have given her a dressing down, had he not been conducting a conversation about new models of business with his stepson. She was never going to call him her stepbrother. Beside her father sat his new wife, who was simpering and filling his plate up with food. Feifei was nauseated. It had only been six months after her mother’s passing when they got hitched. Six months. She hadn’t known how heartless her father could be. No wonder he was such a successful businessman and their express delivery service was number one in the country.

Of course, there were more reasons for that. Her father had managed to offer as tribute a great deal of money to the Procurator-General of the Highest Court that would ensure him a free pass for anything and everything. He really was such an effective businessman, Feifei thought, effective and without a conscience.

The conscience of the family had been her mother. Now that she was gone and replaced by someone who clearly didn’t mind stabbing her way up to the top, the burden was on Feifei. To have a conscience in their world was arguably laughable. But she couldn’t bear the thought of her mother being disappointed in her. Feifei knew that her mother would do the right thing. She just didn’t know if she could follow that all the way through.

“Feifei.” Her father called suddenly and she looked up. He looked like he was in a good mood. The stepson was good at pandering. “How is everything with Zhou Mi?”

Zhou Mi was her boyfriend of two years, tall and lanky and a successful marketing director. He was also the sole heir to his family’s real estate corporation, which was why her father approved of him so much. More money was good. A rich son-in-law was even better. Feifei and Zhou Mi would get married in half a year if things were to go her father’s way, but she didn’t play by those rules.

“Good.” She put a piece of meat into her mouth and chewed. It was very good. Her father didn’t go for anything less than excellent. “He’s busy. I’ll tell him you asked.”

She could see Wu Yifan not even bothering to conceal his irritating smile. Of course everyone else called him Kris without the surname, but Feifei liked to do things otherwise. Who else better than her to remind him all the time that he didn’t have Wang blood running in him? Her mother would be proud. She shot him a dirty glare and he smiled still, but looked down at his plate and began to eat. His mother, however, attempted to make conversation. Feifei thought that she was either too stupid or naive to think that she would succeed.

“Yes, it’s been so long since Zhou Mi’s come to visit,” she smiled and Feifei cocked an eyebrow, “why don’t you invite him over again sometime?”

“That sounds like a good idea, Mrs. Wang.” Feifei’s smile didn’t reach her eyes. It was cruel but she didn’t care. She didn’t like the woman one bit. “Zhou Mi does have to work for a living, but he’ll come over when he has a little more free time for himself. After all, working life is tough. Being a missus is just slightly easier, don’t you think?”

She inclined her head as if to seek agreement, and smiled even wider when she saw Mrs. Wang bite back on her lip. Feifei could also see Yifan’s tightened grip on his chopsticks. Good. Tolerating them in her house didn’t mean that she had to be kind to them. It was Feifei’s way of doing things. Her father shot her a disapproving look but didn’t say anything. Despite her mother’s death, Feifei still very much had the financial backing of her maternal grandparents. Even her father had to defer to that sometimes, if he was thinking about the big picture. This was why Feifei couldn’t understand the intense desire that the new Mrs. Wang had for the legal position of wife. Her father never gave anything to anyone unless it could be of potential use for him.

Wu Yifan was not a potential use for anything. Feifei was surprised enough that her father was so generous to a kid that wasn’t his own: Wu Yifan received just slightly less of whatever she got. When she moved to the States, he’d followed in less than six months. Her father had always been disappointed in the lack of a male heir, but Feifei didn’t think that he would actually consider appointing Yifan as such. It wouldn’t be right. But now she was on highest alert. Yifan wasn’t responding to her words like he usually did, because he never stood for her subtle snark much. Now he had let go of his chopsticks and was looking at her with a rather odd, peaceful expression. It disturbed Feifei.

“Only people with good fortune get to spend their time as they wish. Don’t you agree, _jie_?” Wu Yifan had the nerve to smile at her after saying that. Feifei wanted to throw her plate at his face, but clamped it down. She put down her chopsticks slowly and wiped her mouth. He was still waiting for a reaction but she wasn’t going to give him one. Wu Yifan didn’t deserve it. “Besides, Dad and Mom are very blessed to have you help run the company.”

Shameless. Feifei kept on smiling. It had turned into a faceoff of hypocritical smiles, somewhat, and Feifei wasn’t going to lose. Yifan had managed to make her father laugh with that last remark, and he made everyone raise their glasses in a toast to her working abilities. As they clinked glasses Feifei glared in Yifan’s direction so hard that her eyes hurt. He merely tilted his glass in return.

“Your younger brother’s right, Feifei.” Her father said and gulped down another glass of the whiskey he’d ordered. “You’re very capable. But maybe you can do with some help. What do you think of Yifan coming in to help you out?”

Her father was insane. All of the dad-calling must have addled his brain. There could be no other reason. But now she realised what he’d done, planned and plotted for so long in order to come to this very day. He was making headway into the Wang inheritance, no matter how small. Feifei’s breaths were short and sharp but she tried to keep her mind steady. It didn’t matter—couldn’t matter—because she would take him down.

“Why not?” She raised her glass in defiance and smiled. “We _are_ siblings, after all.”

 

 

* * *

 

It was common for people in the social circle above them to think that they needed to pander to the main family branch for everything. Zhang Yixing knew otherwise, but preferred not to correct people who thought that way. Keep your enemies dumb, as they said, and you are the winner. He couldn’t remember who actually said that, but figured it was a good life motto. His family wasn’t poor, not by a long stretch, but upper class society seemed to have it in them that anybody not from a main family branch was not worth anything.

The thing was, the main branch depended on them to live. Yixing’s family got on famously, but there was no need for the other rich kids to know. He rather liked it that they stayed away from him. He’d seen the way that some of the guys in Lu Han’s circle had tried to hit on his heiress cousin, and it was appalling. All of them needed more schooling in the ways of manners. Not that he had anything to worry about, since his cousin was not in the least interested in any of them. They were close, and he had thought it his personal mission to weed out the people who wanted in on her inheritance ever since Zhang Liyin had threatened their prep school’s bullies with expulsion during high school.

“Jie?” He called and hoped she could hear him upstairs. Liyin had come to visit him while Lu Han was back home in Beijing. Somehow they never much got to meet each other, but Yixing figured they’d probably seen enough of each other when they were in China. Their social circle revolved around the same few families, and others (like his) were never considered privileged enough to be let in. “Dinner’s ready!”

It took a few minutes before Liyin scrambled down in a college sweatshirt and shorts. “But I said I’d cook!” She sounded so dismayed that Yixing wanted to apologise, before he remembered what had happened the last time Liyin had cooked. He wasn’t sure he wanted to go through that sort of stomach upset again.

“Don’t—I mean, it’s fine. Only the two of us here, no need to show off your cooking skills.” Yixing stammered a bit but at least Liyin looked convinced. “Besides, Lu Han hasn’t had the honour of tasting your cooking yet.”

Liyin rolled her eyes and looked like she wanted to say something mean in return, but refrained herself. It was the heiress training at work, Yixing observed wryly. Lu Han had a similar mode that kicked in whenever they bumped into one of his friends from home. Yixing couldn’t describe it but the two of them were more similar than they would think. Perhaps it was the destined-for-greatness track that they were riding on. Liyin was preparing to pursue an MBA at Harvard while working at the American office of their family enterprise. Yixing was trying to be a civil engineer. Sometimes he paled in comparison, but it didn’t bother him that much. The whole not being from the highest tier of the social pyramid thing was a good cover. He could do anything and not be judged for it too much.

“Lu Han’s mom wants to get him a wife.” Yixing said casually when they had begun eating. “Didn’t that go out of fashion a millenia ago?”

Liyin screwed up her nose and shrugged. “Not in our world, no.” She reached over for another mouthful of vegetables and chewed slowly. “My parents were betrothed. Mom didn’t even see Dad until their wedding night. Talk about old school.”

Yixing laughed. His aunt and uncle were not exactly the most loving couple out there, but they were great together for both their business and personal lives. “You and Lu Han said exactly the same thing, by the way.”

Liyin had on that heiress expression again. She and Lu Han weren’t friends, not exactly, but Yixing didn’t understand why she always looked like she was in dire pain around him. Lu Han was an abnormality in his class of kids who possessed nothing but money. He had drive and motivation, both traits Yixing thought Liyin would gravitate towards. Instead Liyin always looked at Lu Han like he was something unpleasant.

“Funny. He and I couldn’t be more different.” Liyin pulled up the edges of her lips into a smile and set her chopsticks down. “Anyway, I forgot to ask. Dad bought a new place near downtown and I don’t really want to move in alone. You wanna come along?”

Yixing raised his eyebrows. Liyin had always lived alone in an upscale apartment complex. She hadn’t said anything about wanting to move to a new house. She looked at him, tapping her fingers on the table and waiting for an answer. Somehow Yixing had the feeling that this was only being brought up because Lu Han wasn’t around to complicate the situation.

“Jie, is there anything wrong with your current place? I mean, you’ve lived there forever, so what’s the rush to move out now? Besides, I think I’m good here. We’re near the school, and—”

Liyin cut him off with a lift of her hand. “Yeah I know. But your mom has been asking me forever why you’re not staying with me but with—” She paused and had that look on again for the briefest moment before continuing. “With the Lu boy. I have space, so just move in, okay?”

“The Lu boy?” Yixing frowned. “You know Lu Han. He’s my friend, you two run in the same social circles, you _know_ him. What’s up, jie? Why do you make it sound like he’s drivel or something? That’s exactly what all those kids did to me back in high school, remember?”

Liyin took a deep breath and was silent before she spoke again in a low voice: “Because he _is_ drivel. His family is high class drivel.”

The air was very, very still. Liyin held his stare all the way until he dropped his chopsticks onto his plate and stood up abruptly to pick up their dishes and stride towards the dishwasher. He could hear Liyin push her chair back and follow behind him. Yixing didn’t want to keep quiet—he wanted to say something in defense of his friend, but what could he? Liyin and Lu Han ran in the same circles. He didn’t. It was shameful, the way he wanted to help but was helpless to.

“Yixing…” Liyin began tentatively as he started to load the dishwasher. “I know he’s your friend, but I don’t want you to be around him so much. His… his family is not the kind you want to be dealing with. Can you trust your cousin, please? Your sister?”

She was right. He and Liyin were almost siblings, closer than any one of his friends could ever be to him. Her words carried much more significance than anyone else. Liyin also never lied, and as Yixing’s mind started justifying her words to him, the dread pooled even deeper. But Lu Han was his friend, one that was always on the look out for him. Lu Han was supposed to be different. Yixing closed his eyes briefly and tried not to be distracted as he set the dishwasher to work.

When he got out of the kitchen, Liyin had gone upstairs to pick up her bag. Yixing noted almost unkindly that it was from Hermés. She and Lu Han really did come from the same sort of universe. Lu Han never carried anything from one of the lesser fashion houses. What was common to them was almost foreign to him. It was funny, because the only difference between them was the number of zeroes in their annual income.

“I’m sorry.” She said and pulled him into a hug. “I stepped out of line. But I want you to know that my offer still stands.”

Liyin pulled away and looked at him for a moment, before reaching to pat him on the head. “If you ever need a new place to stay, just call me.” Yixing mutely hugged her again before crossing the hall to open the door for her. He could see Liyin’s grey BMW just at the end of their driveway. She put a hand on his shoulder again before she stepped out of the house and walked towards her car. Yixing stood at the door and watched until she pulled out of the driveway and disappeared completely out of sight.


	3. 三五在東

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wu Yifan tries to figure out what his stepsister Wang Feifei is hiding, while Lu Han grows suspicious, and Ahn Minseok throws a party.

三五在東  
_three or five of them in the east_

 

 

Feifei met Zhou Mi for lunch a week after she discovered the secret about Procurator-General Lu’s bribe soliciting hidden within her father’s accounting files. Zhou Mi always chose the trendiest new cafes when he took Feifei out for lunch. Dinner, of course, was a classier affair in exclusive restaurants open only by reservation. But for lunch he picked the places that were just about to hit it big, and made Feifei take a selfie with him each time as record that he’d been there before it became popular. He’d acclimated himself to Shanghai very quickly, although he wasn’t from there originally. He liked Shanghai, though. Good clubs. Good for business. His family was in high-end real estate, and Zhou Mi was the marketing director, a job he excelled at. When they were married, Feifei’s father hoped he could somehow absorb Zhou Mi into their family’s business, though it was unlikely.

“How is the stepmother?” Zhou Mi asked as they surveyed the menu. The cafe was situated in a trendy district with a good view, and Feifei kept looking out the window at the people walking the street outside.

“Evil,” she said absently.

“And the stepbrother?”

“Obsessed with me.” Feifei sniffed and turned back to her menu. Only Zhou Mi would get that that wasn’t a statement of vanity, but a description of the battlefield. “He followed me the other day.”

Zhou Mi looked at her over his menu. “This is turning into a trashy romance novel a _lot_ sooner than I predicted.”

Feifei rolled her eyes, balled up a napkin, and threw it at his face. “Don’t you dare,” she said, trying to bite back a smile. Zhou Mi had assessed her stepbrother very quickly the first time he met him—“ _straighter than a ruler, but handsome, and very determined._ ”

Zhou Mi laughed. “I _do_ dare, my dear. Anyway, where was he following you?”

Feifei looked back out the window again. She could tell Zhou Mi in great detail the things she’d discovered while combing through the books at her father’s company, but she wasn’t sure how he’d react. If she told anyone, it would be him.

“My mother’s grave,” she said.

“That was tactless of him,” Zhou Mi observed. Feifei’s eyebrows lifted.

“Yeah, it was.” She fiddled with the edges of the menu. It was possible that Zhou Mi already knew that Procurator-General Lu was dirty. It was possible that everyone knew. Maybe Feifei was only kidding herself. She had watched a lot of American movies lately, ones where some lone hero was the only one who could save the world. Maybe those had addled her judgment.

“You’re not telling me something.”

She looked up. Zhou Mi’s usual cheerful smile was gone, replaced with genuine concern. She shouldn’t tell him. Then again, maybe he could talk her out of it.

“Tell me something,” she said very quietly, leaning across the table. Now Zhou Mi looked even more concerned, and leaned in close. “If for some reason the Lu family was to become—was to fall out of favor, what would happen to the rest of us?”

Zhou Mi’s concern melted away to stone-cold seriousness. “Why would the Lu family fall out of favor?”

“It’s just a question,” Feifei tried to make her voice sound innocent, but she couldn’t restrain the falter in her smile, and of course Zhou Mi noticed. He reached out across the table and grabbed her hand.

“What’s going on?” he asked.

Feifei sighed, shaking her head and gripping hard on Zhou Mi’s hand. “They’re dirty, Mi. I don’t mean in the usual way, okay? Procurator-General Lu…” She couldn’t quite bring herself to say it.

“What?” Zhou Mi demanded, his voice more distressed now.

“Bribes, okay? In the millions.”

Zhou Mi blinked, his emotions rushing across his face. He was seriously disturbed. Of course he was. They all should be.

“How do you know this?” he asked.

Feifei looked outside again. So many people in this country and here she was, balanced at the very top of the pyramid. What would happen if she used what she knew? Would the whole country come spinning apart? Funny how their modern China was built on the ideals of that pyramid not even existing. Funny.

“I’ve seen the numbers,” she said softly. She managed a weak smile. “We’re not clean, either.”

Zhou Mi sat back in his chair. He ran his hands through his perfectly styled hair and looked up at the ceiling. Feifei played with the rings on her fingers. There was nothing else to say.

“Don’t say anything yet, okay?” Zhou Mi sat forward again and took both of her hands in his. “We’ll figure this out. We’ll figure out how to make things right without sending the whole country into an economic tailspin.”

Feifei rolled her eyes. “You can’t guarantee that.”

Zhou Mi rested his palm against her cheek, forcing her to look up at him. He grinned.

“Yeah, but you can.”

Feifei nodded, even though she didn’t believe him yet. But it wasn’t a matter of belief. It was necessity. She would bring down the Lus without breaking the country apart. She had to. Being the next generation of society’s top tier certainly meant she had a responsibility to try.

 

* * *

 

She had one week before she headed back to America, where she was working on her Master’s degree in international relations. In that time Feifei carefully collected evidence, storing photographs on encrypted drives and following a dozen other security precautions Zhou Mi had listed. Her father suspected nothing—sometimes she doubted her father truly thought she would be able to take the reins at the company when he was gone. He’d groomed her for it, but maybe he was reverting to old sexist ideals, now that he had Wu Yifan in front of him.

Wu Yifan, for his part, was a constant splinter Feifei could not dig out. She worried about hiding her secret from him the most, especially since he already guessed she had _something_ to hide, even if he had no idea what it was. While he pushed and prodded Feifei for answers, he kept working on manipulating his way into the family network. At the end of the week they visited Feifei’s paternal grandparents, and Wu Yifan abandoned his usual campaign on unveiling Feifei’s secret and focused on her grandparents instead.

Wu Yifan’s shameless groveling in front of her grandparents only annoyed Feifei, initially, but when they returned to the spacious house where Feifei and Yifan occupied the entire third floor, she sat down at her desk and attempted to click through important emails, but instead found herself stewing. She kept thinking about Yifan’s carefully worded statements, the way his mother put up a grand charade of being the perfectly dutiful wife, and how her father seemed charmed by the whole show. The worst part was that it had _worked_ —now Feifei’s grandmother thought Wu Yifan was a charming young man, and kept complimenting him to Feifei’s father. Gritting her teeth, Fei pushed back from her desk and stood up. It was time she cut the crap and put Wu Yifan in his place. He wasn’t going to get her secret out of her, and he wasn’t going to steal her inheritance, and she was going to be damn sure he knew that.

The house was large and drafty, so she slid a robe on over her pajamas, and walked out into the hall. All the lights were off except for the one shining out from under Yifan’s door. She crossed the hall and knocked softly, somehow afraid that the sound would carry all the way to her father and stepmother’s bedroom on the first floor of the house.

Yifan yanked the door open and stared down at her. “What’s wrong?” he asked. She took in his t-shirt and sweatpants, clothes that looked cheap but cost a fortune. Then she pushed past him and into his room. For a room that up until a few months ago Yifan had never even seen, he had certainly managed to fill it with plenty of his stuff.

“You know perfectly well what’s wrong,” Feifei said, crossing her arms over her chest and turning to face him. He ran a hand through his hair and Feifei observed that he needed a haircut, badly, unless he was attempting to go for a spot in a boy band. His bangs hung just past his eyebrows, which was fine for a smoldering pop star but ridiculous for an aspiring professional.

“No, not really,” he said. He came closer to her, probably just so she would be forced to look up. “We had a really great time with your grandparents, and somehow you manage to think it’s worth fighting about—is that it?”

Feifei rolled her eyes. She couldn’t believe how _easily_ he twisted events to suit his own vision of his life. Manipulation was like second nature to him, probably taught from birth by that awful woman.

“You frame yourself like this perfect child, this loving stepson, but I _know_ you, Wu Yifan,” she said carefully, coldly. “You want to play this game? You think you can just replace me in this family? You’re fighting against _me_. And I don’t lose.”

Yifan’s jaw clenched. “You’re the one who wants to see it as a _game_ , jie. But you’re the only one playing.”

Feifei laughed. “So, what? We’re just the perfect, happy blended family?”

He took a step closer to her, and he looked more pissed off than before. Feifei was running on sheer adrenaline, now, and she wasn’t going to leave until she broke him. He would break. She was sure of it. And if she couldn’t break him with her words—well, there were other ways to break a man.

“That’s not really possible, is it, when my older sister decided from the beginning to bully me every chance she got.”

She pretended to pout and watched his eyes darken as she did so. “Poor Wu Yifan. One person doesn’t want to listen to his sob story—must be bullying him. Someone calls him on his bullshit attempts to make himself rich—so cruel. Someone calls his mother what she is, a fucking gold digger, and—”

“Don’t you dare say a thing about my mother.”

Yifan’s voice was so low and dark that Feifei actually faltered. But it was the first thing he’d said that sounded sincere—which mean he was cracking. Feifei arched an eyebrow.

“Should I pretend I haven’t overheard the things she says about my mother?”

His brow furrowed and he gave her a bitter smile. “My mother hasn’t said a _thing_ —”

Feifei smiled slowly. “I’ve overheard her on the phone with her friends every damn day since you all moved in here. She speaks incredibly freely.”

She watched as Yifan put the puzzle pieces together. His face paled when he realized.

“You understand Cantonese,” he said in a flat voice.

She smiled in reply. “It’s extraordinarily easy to remember the exact words someone uses when she is insulting your dead mother. Each word gets burned right into your memory, you know. They stick in there, rattling around—but here’s the secret. Everything you two try only makes me stronger. You’re only feeding the fire.”

She thought, for one brief and victorious moment, that she had broken him already. But after a few seconds their eyes met again and his were dark, unreadable. Like his mother, he wouldn’t break easily. At the very least, Feifei had to recognize him as a formidable opponent.

“Hate me all you want,” he said, his voice low and dark, “But I’m not going anywhere. And I know you’re hiding something, and I’m going to find out what it is.”

Now they were barely a foot away from one another, Feifei forced to arch her neck to look up at him, Yifan leaning into her space. Her blood pulsed with fire. She would win.

“I will break you,” she told him.

He grinned bitterly. “You think so?” His eyes widened. They were very close now. “Here’s the thing—you haven’t had to fight for anything in your life. The only child of filthy rich parents, winding them around your little finger since birth—you’re not like me. You’ve never tasted failure so you don’t know what it’s like to claw your way back to where you want to be. Maybe you’ll win this game. But you won’t break me.”

Feifei’s lips parted into a smile. Foolish boy. She lifted onto her tiptoes so she was very close to his ear, and whispered, “Just wait.”

He turned his head to look at her. Her eyes drifted to his mouth, then back up to his dark gaze. Her blood pounded in her ears. She was daring him. There were so many ways to destroy a man.

He kissed her first. And with that, she knew she could break him.

He pushed her back flush against the wall and she snaked her hands under his t-shirt, running her palms across his feverish skin. They weren’t kissing so much as fighting with their mouths and tongues instead of their words. He untied her robe and she let it slide to the ground. Somewhere in the back of her mind a warning bell rang faintly, but she couldn’t hear it over her blood pounding in her ears. He tasted like her victory and she knew she would win.

He pulled away from the wall and in that motion Feifei swerved out from his arms, picking up her robe in a smooth motion and opening the door before he realized what had happened. She looked back at him and smiled sweetly.

“Have a good night, didi,” she said.

She closed the door on his stunned face.

 

* * *

 

Lu Han took a deep breath when he got off the plane in Los Angeles. Now that he was out of Beijing, maybe he could forget everything he’d learned this trip home. Go back to being his old self—the Lu Han who didn’t care about anything except for the next weekend’s parties and getting his car redone and didn’t lie in bed sick with the strange feeling of guilt.

He went through immigration and down to baggage claim and that’s when he spotted Wang Feifei next to one of the conveyor belts, looking every part the heiress. A moment later, Kris Wu appeared next to her. Lu Han first met Kris a few years back, when his family had connections but relatively little money compared to those traveling in their circles. Now he had both, and Feifei for a stepsister. Lu Han wondered—as numerous others in their social circle had already—if the two of them fooled around under the guise of being a happy family. Feifei certainly wasn’t getting satisfied by her boyfriend.

Lu Han walked up to them and tapped Feifei on the shoulder. He and Kris were better friends, but Feifei would not take it well if he greeted Kris first. “Long time no see,” he said with a smile. She turned around and smiled back.

“Lu Han,” she said. Lu Han blinked. She seemed—unhappy to see him. A moment later the feeling was gone, though. Lu Han turned to Kris and clapped him into an American-style hug.

“You guys just get in?” Lu Han asked.

“Yes. Safe flight?” Feifei’s voice was smooth and well-trained. Lu Han didn’t expect anything less, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was being handled.

“Yeah. I have to take something to knock me out on those international flights, so I just slept the whole time.” Lu Han knew something was awkward, but it wasn’t the small talk. It was the way Feifei stared so intently at him, instead of what she usually did, her eyes darting around the room and taking everything in. Instead, she was just taking _him_ in, and that could mean a thousand things. “You all heading over to Minseok’s tonight?”

Kris nodded. “Probably.”

“Unlikely,” Feifei said at almost the same time. Kris gave her a look—so Lu Han figured, definitely sleeping together—but Feifei hadn’t looked away from Lu Han yet. “I’m surprised you have time for parties, Lu Han. It’s your senior year, isn’t it? I doubt your father would take it very well.”

 

 

 

Kris watched the exchange between two of the richest children of China with great interest. They might as well be speaking in dialect, as little as Kris could glean from the conversation.

Lu Han smiled—he always smiled, like a defense mechanism or something. “Everyone needs time to unwind,” he said. “It’s just a party. You should come. You know Minseok is legendary.”

“I know,” Feifei said. “Seems like just last week I was talking about the Ahns with one of our investors. Sounded like Minseok shouldn’t be throwing parties any more than you should be going to them.”

Now they were just staring at each other. It was like watching a sword fight being undertaken with the eyes. Kris wondered what would happen if he stepped in. At the very least, he could get a rise out of Feifei, which would be a win for him and also kind of hot.

“Lu Han doesn’t need you to babysit him,” Kris said.

But something strange happened. Feifei didn’t react. Her eyes drifted very slowly from Lu Han to Kris, and then she smiled. Now Kris was only more sure she had a secret—and maybe it was scarier than he originally thought. Maybe Feifei didn’t have something to hide, but a plan to carry out.

“That’s true,” Feifei said with her odd smile. She turned back to Lu Han. “It’s good to see you.”

Their personal assistant—a temporary loan from Feifei’s father—had already loaded their suitcases onto a luggage cart, so Feifei was able to saunter away, leaving Lu Han glaring at her back. His face was slowly turning red.

“Hey, man, see you tonight,” Kris said, clapping Lu Han on the shoulder. Lu Han looked up, but he didn’t smile.

“Yeah, see you later.”

Kris followed Feifei. He had a twenty minute car ride to figure out what the hell just happened, and he’d better get started.

 

 

 

Feifei slid into the backseat of the sedan they’d hired to take her and Yifan from the airport to their homes. Yifan had an expensive townhome, and Feifei lived in the large family home in a gated community a short drive away. She only used one of the suites and a few of the rooms on the first floor, and she thought it was eerie living there alone—Zhou Mi only visited every few months—but she would never invite Yifan to live there with her.

Yifan climbed into the seat next to her a minute later and pushed his sunglasses back on the bridge of his nose. Then he turned to Feifei and grinned.

“So tell me something,” he said in Cantonese. Feifei froze. He would only use Cantonese if he didn’t want the driver and the assistant to understand them, which meant Feifei was being caught off-guard. “You and Lu Han. What’s going on there?”

Feifei restrained the urge to sigh with relief. Yifan had no clue. She didn’t think Lu Han did, either. He would have figured out something was _wrong_ , but connecting those dots would be tricky even for him.

“Nothing,” she told Yifan, in Mandarin. After all, she had nothing to hide. “What do you think is going on?”

Yifan was still grinning. “I don’t know. But I think a Wang marrying a Lu would be a horrifically advantageous match.”

Feifei had to be careful. If she used too heavy a hand here, Yifan would be suspicious. Yifan believing she had designs on Lu Han wasn’t a bad smoke screen to have in place, now that he’d brought it up.

“I’ve known Lu Han since we were children,” she said. She could tell the assistant was listening intently in the passenger seat. “You’re imagining things.”

“So if I just send Zhou Mi a friendly text—”

He pulled out his phone and Feifei grabbed his wrist in a flash. She held on tight, feeling his bones in her grip. She didn’t have to say anything. He thought she was scared, now, and he smiled very slowly, like a shark. Feifei slowly released his wrist, and let her hand drop so it rested on his thigh. She couldn’t see his eyes through his sunglasses, but she could see the involuntary movement of his Adam’s apple as her hand inched slowly upward.

“Kris,” she smiled, “You’re imagining things.”

She pulled her hand away and looked out the window. Surely he was adequately confused by now—Yifan would become immune to her sexual advances sooner or later if she didn’t follow through with them, but for now the temptation was effective in itself. And if he was fairly sure she was angling for a marriage with Lu Han—that was better. She could use that, maybe even to get inside the Lu mansion here in Los Angeles. She couldn’t guarantee she’d find anything there, but Lu Han’s father would have records of his dealings somewhere in the world—they could be here, or some trace of them. She just had to be careful, and smart.

Feifei kept looking out the window. She was in dangerous territory. Everything would be a covert operation from here on out.

 

* * *

 

Yixing had been out of the shower five minutes when Lu Han burst into his room, grey Scottish Fold in hand. He stared as Lu Han set the cat down on his bed and gave him one of those smiles that clearly scored him all the girls within a fifty mile radius. Yixing didn’t know what else to do but continue towelling his hair dry as Mew Mew padded around cautiously on the bed. Lu Han flopped down in one of the chairs nearby.

“Why is your cat in my room?” Yixing stepped into his walk-in wardrobe and pulled on a shirt. He could see Lu Han shrug in the mirror, his hand lazily calling out for Mew Mew. “Dude, your cat. On my bed. Why.”

“Birthday. Party. Isolation. Practice.” Lu Han had procured one of Mew Mew’s play balls out of his pocket and was throwing it idly in the air. Yixing frowned at him as he sat down on the bed. Mew Mew came to him instantaneously and he scratched her chin. She was cute, but he needed reasons. “I don’t want anyone stepping on her. You know Zitao would do that by complete accident.”

That was also true. Yixing rubbed Mew Mew’s head a couple more times as Lu Han stayed quiet and continued throwing the ball upwards. Lu Han’s birthday party was always more extravagant than the year before, and his mother had decreed that it be made more special for his twenty-fifth this year. Yixing couldn’t really understand why, but he didn’t bother asking either.

“You know Wang Feifei?” Lu Han asked suddenly. Yixing nodded. He and Kris were college mates, and while he knew very little about Kris’s personal life (too many people in it, mostly female), he did recognise the heiress to the Wang fortune. Lu Han sucked his cheeks in and continued throwing the ball.

“Yeah, Kris’s stepsister. Why?” Mew Mew had curled up near his feet to sleep. Yixing patted it softly on the head and it purred.

“Met them at the airport on the way back. They are so fucking fishy, it’s crazy.” Lu Han caught the ball and sat up straight. “She talked to me like I was some sort of… I don’t know, oddity? We spoke like, five times last year. What the fuck is going on, man.”

Yixing laughed. “You think they’re screwing each other.”

Lu Han frowned. “I think they’re screwing each other. Maybe.” He gave him an almost apprehensive look. “What bad could come of that, right?”

“Uh, I wouldn’t know.” Yixing deadpanned. “I’m not in the habit of screwing anything with two legs. And I also don’t have a hot step sister.”

“Yes, because that’s Sehun’s prerogative, and you’re a fucking prude.”

Yixing was used to being teased for his more conservative attitudes toward sex and ignored Lu Han’s jibe, rolling his eyes instead. But Lu Han wouldn’t let the subject go.

“I mean it, seriously—what wrong could come out of it?” Lu Han was being unnaturally pushy. Yixing gave him an enquiring look, but he brushed it off with a wave of his hand.

“Why do you even care? It’s not like Kris would dare either.” Yixing knew that Kris was new to the whole crazily wealthy scene. In order to stay here he needed to be constantly in the good books of the Wang patriarch. From the looks of it he was doing quite the good job, so he didn’t need to mess up by screwing around with Feifei. “He’s not going to fuck up the status quo.”

Lu Han looked like he was seriously contemplating the issue. Too seriously, in fact, for the casual way he was asking these questions. Yixing stroked Mew Mew as Lu Han’s eyes darted from him to the cat, then back again.

“Yeah? What if he does?” Lu Han said it like it was almost a challenge. “What if _she_ does?”

Now that was just bordering on absurd. Yixing actually laughed out loud. “Buddy, you need to listen to what you’re saying right now. It doesn’t matter if Kris is a stud or whatever, Wang Feifei is completely out of his league.” He reached over to clap Lu Han on the shoulder. “She’s not going to fuck Kris Wu. Trust me on this.”

Lu Han narrowed his eyes and rolled them. Yixing swore he heard Lu Han mutter something obscene in some Beijing slang under his breath. Whatever, he could do the same in Sichuanese. Lu Han picked up Mew Mew, who jolted awake and starting meowing very loudly, and made his way to the door.

“If you’re going to get to Minseok’s party on time, I suggest you start getting ready now, Cassandra of the East.” It was Yixing’s turn to roll his eyes. Lu Han had the habit of quoting things from literature that he didn’t read.

“And you should stop worrying about the sex life of people who don’t matter to you.” He countered and Lu Han flipped him off with the hand that wasn't carrying Mew Mew. Yixing laughed as loudly as he could as the door slammed shut, and Lu Han kicked the door open again in retaliation. He was being ridiculous, Yixing thought. Even if they were screwing each other, it wouldn’t affect any of them. The Wang family was all kinds of messed up, and while everyone seemed to accept Kris, nobody would expect him to be honourable, of all things. So even if he had stooped to sleeping with Feifei, Yixing still found it nobody’s but their sordid business alone.

 

* * *

 

The butler had set up the bar in the main hall too early, but it made grabbing a drink more convenient. Minseok took off his cufflinks and pushed up the sleeves of his white shirt to the elbows, as he waited for the bartender to mix up something “intense and attention grabbing”. In actuality he couldn’t be fucked if it was straight vodka with chai tea or something. He needed a drink to get over the work he’d been deluged with by an impromptu call from the office. It was Saturday, but of course the Acting General Manager had to go back when needed. The bartender slid a glass of amber liquid over, and Minseok downed half of it.

Sohee had also called multiple times, and he’d ignored all of them. He knew why she was looking for him: Grandfather was in town, and he was supposed to be at a wine tasting session with them right about now. Minseok looked down at his wrist and was pleased to see that he was already an hour and a half late.

“Sir,” the butler appeared by his side, “Mr. Lu and Mr. Zhang are here.” Minseok was surprised. He knew that Yixing was an early sort of person, but Lu Han was rarely on time for parties. Mostly because he hopped around different places restlessly, but Minseok got up from his seat anyway. Yixing and Lu Han appeared a few minutes later, and Minseok gave the both of them a firm side-hug each. He had been in the same university as them, but only he was out in the working world now.

“Early,” Minseok cocked an eyebrow, “but never too early for whiskey.” He ushered them to the bar, where Lu Han ordered a whiskey on the rocks and Yixing a mocktail. He and Lu Han stared at Yixing in horror, who only shrugged casually.

“Trying to keep my liver intact for, you know, the rest of my life.” Lu Han shoved him in the shoulder and poured some of his whiskey into Yixing’s glass when their drinks arrived. Minseok cracked a grin at Yixing trying to pull his drink away to no avail. When he was still in school they used to drink privately together all the time. Nowadays it was all about big parties, as big as they could get. Minseok didn’t mind the company—they kept unnecessary duties away—but sometimes he did miss the quieter vibe.

“Didn’t you just get back from Beijing?” He asked Lu Han, whose face dropped almost immediately. “Who’s the lucky child bride?”

Yixing high-fived him. Lu Han glared at them, swirling his glass violently. “I’d like to see you say that to Kyungsoo.” He said and Minseok laughed. “Try telling him that he has Minseul as a child bride, I dare you.”

He wasn’t a fan of courting trouble like that, but the opportunity to mock Lu Han was too good to pass up. “I’ll do it if you tell him that you have one as well.” Minseok grinned and Lu Han reached over to hit him up the back of his head. He dodged with dexterity, and Yixing whooped.

“Guess who Lu Han met at the airport.” Yixing began after an extended round of Lu Han teasing. Minseok shook his head. He didn’t have a presence on social media, while Lu Han updated frequently with artistically posed photos overlaid with hipster filters. Yixing wiggled his eyebrows at Lu Han, who brushed him off impatiently. “Wang Feifei and Kris.”

“So?” Minseok motioned to the bartender for another glass. “He was back in Shanghai, wasn’t he? Given how much his stepfather likes to parade their happy family image around, I’m not surprised if he made them fly back together.”

Even though he wasn’t Chinese, Minseok understood the obsession Kris’s stepfather had with keeping up appearances. Face was everything to them, the people standing at the very pinnacle. If you were on top it was only natural to be flawless. Kris had been added in at the last minute, but that didn’t mean he was free to not play by the rules. Minseok was sure that his stepfather held him firmly in an iron vice.

“And I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s fucking her.” Lu Han said darkly and Minseok leaned in to listen with interest. “Scandal of the year if it’s true.”

Yixing laughed. “I’m saying this again, but she is so out of his league. Why would she sleep with the kid of the woman that she seems to hate with so much vitriol?” Minseok had to agree. Lu Han shrugged and finished his drink, before turning to Minseok’s wrist with interest.

“Is that Vacheron-Constantin? Patrimony collection?” He asked and Minseok fiddled to take the watch off. Lu Han and he shared a common interest in watches, while Yixing was more of a sound system fan. He could see that Yixing had already tuned out, looking at his phone and scrolling downwards avidly. He and Lu Han had too many things in common, Minseok thought sometimes. But he had none of Lu Han’s naivete.

“Retrograde Day-Date.” Minseok handed the watch over and Lu Han examined it closely, eyes gleaming. “Their PR department had Sohee pick out a couple of pieces for herself the other day.”

“Impeccable taste,” Lu Han nodded in approval, “and how much did they fling your sister’s way?”

Minseok shrugged. “Eighty thousand. They want their new collection to be seen on her wrist the next time she’s at some gala event.”

Lu Han seemed to consider the number for a while. Funny, Minseok thought as he gestured for another drink, because eighty thousand dollars didn’t seem like a big deal for Lu Han. Their Beijing branch was the one that Lu Han’s family banked with for their Korean brokerage portfolios, and Minseok knew how long the figures ran.

“That seems like a lot of money to spend on one person.” Lu Han mused as the bartender delivered Minseok’s new drink. He agreed somewhat, but at the same time this was also fair trade of some sort. Paying to get mutual benefits was a common practice in business. Lu Han had a long way to go if he was to succeed his father’s position. Yixing was still scrolling on his iPhone, and Minseok could see over his shoulder that he was looking at somebody’s Facebook profile. Lu Han spoke again before he managed to catch a name. “Two watches. Eighty thousand dollars. Wow.”

“You’re being so fucking philosophical today.” Minseok said and Lu Han blinked at him. “That black Ferrari that you parked in my garage just now? At least a few times what they gave my sister. Money is just a commodity, man. Don’t get all wistful over it.” He knew that Lu Han collected cars like he did watches, a habit enabled by his Procurator-General father. Minseok also knew why he was able to do it, but it wasn’t his place to tell Lu Han what to do.

Lu Han would probably fare better if he had no idea about anything at all.


	4. 肅肅宵征

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sohee storms Minseok’s party when he skips a meeting with their grandfather, step-siblings Kris and Feifei continue their battle, and Tao and Sehun take their friend Jia to their favorite kind of party: one devoted to celebrating luxury cars.

 

肅肅宵征  
_away to battle we go in the night_

 

 

It took a series of hard knocks before the doors of the mansion booming with unintelligible dubstep music opened. Ahn Sohee glared at the redhead who answered, eyes unfocused and dreamy smile plastered on. He was obviously high and she had no time to deal with people who couldn’t answer questions. So she pushed past him and marched in on her Jimmy Choos. It was a mess inside, writhing bodies and too-loud music, and she shoved a few people out of her way before she managed to spot a familiar face with platinum blonde hair.

“Byun Baekhyun.” She barked before he turned around to look at her. “Where is my brother?”

Byun Baekhyun cocked his head to the side, surveying her before he smiled widely and shrugged. Sohee rolled her eyes. Another high one. She shot him a dark look before she paused, and then knocked his red plastic cup over. He was yelling something after her but Sohee didn’t care. She was here to get her brother’s ass back home because he’d missed a family meeting that would potentially cost him his inheritance. Granted, he never really cared that much, because her brother was the firstborn son and their grandfather was so traditionally Korean that he may as well have been from the Joseon Dynasty. But Sohee didn’t like it when her brother got her into trouble, so she was here for payback.

She pushed another set of doors open when someone tall and in a ridiculous tophat leapt out of nowhere and into her path. Park Chanyeol grinned down at her and shook a red cup in invitation. “Hi Sohee. _So_ nice to see you here.” She knew what he was getting at: she was never at these parties because she wouldn’t deign to accept any of those invitations Chanyeol always sent her via text. She eventually blocked his number because it was getting annoying.

“Where is my brother?” She cut to the chase immediately. Chanyeol’s smile faltered for only a second, before he hollered a question to someone in the distance. The answer came a few moments later, and he proffered a hand. Sohee ignored it and motioned for him to walk on first. Chanyeol continued smiling and took her on a winding path around to yet another set of doors. Sometimes Sohee got tired of so many rooms in a single house but that was how they lived. Even their apartment units had a minimum of five each.

The doors swung open to reveal flashing red lights, lots of dancing bodies, and a pile of alcohol bottles stacked artfully in a pyramid. Sohee narrowed her eyes. In the middle of it all, her brother was sitting in an armchair with a glass in hand, blissfully ignorant that he had managed to mess up again. Next to him was someone wearing the same bored expression he probably did at all parties. Sohee recognised him as Do Kyungsoo, second son of the Do publishing empire. They were the same age but at least he didn’t have an older brother who was constantly stirring up trouble. Do Kyungwon was the model grandson that their grandfather wanted to have but couldn’t, so he had to make do.

“There he is.” Chanyeol whispered into her ear, and she swatted him away. He looked a bit hurt as she strided off but Sohee had more important things to do. Her brother was laughing in some leggy blonde’s hair when she reached over for the cup and poured its contents over his head.

Time might as well have stopped instantaneously. Sohee set the cup down, took a slow look around at everyone’s gaping faces, and crossed her arms. It took two seconds before Chanyeol burst into laughter behind her, and everyone started buzzing with movement again. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Kyungsoo smile. Rare, coming from that one.

“Like that, Ahn Minseok?” She nodded at him mirthlessly. Ahn Minseok let out a long breath and swiped at his hair before looking up at her. Her older brother was pissed, but Sohee was more so. Minseok pushed away the girl who was trying to wipe his hair dry and rose up to meet her at eye level. Sohee wasn’t going to be intimidated.

“Baby sis, don’t do this at my parties, please.” Minseok reached out to pat her on her head twice before turning around to face everyone. “Ok guys, spectacle’s over. Party on!”

Someone turned up the volume again and soon everyone was back to milling around and drinking. Sohee could see the cold anger flash in her brother’s eyes, but he did deserve it. In the background she saw Kyungsoo shake his head and draw an imaginary line across his neck. So much thanks for the late warning. Minseok grabbed her hand, and he led her out of the room. She saw Chanyeol watch all the way until they turned a corner. It took a bit of maneuvering but soon they were on an empty balcony. This house was Minseok’s and she’d been here a fair bit, but it was her first time in this part of the place. Sometimes it was difficult to read her brother. They had been raised quite differently, Sohee thought, and even though Minseok doted on her it was always hard to know when he was being real and when he was not.

Then again, weren’t they all like this? She understood that Minseok didn’t like the whole heir training schtick, but she was his sister. Sohee only wanted Minseok to understand that even if he wanted to be a rebel, it was his thing. Not hers. Sohee wanted to be department head of their investment arm, not a party animal with ten cars and twenty houses and nothing else to their name. Minseok kept quiet for a long while, hands in his pockets and staring at nothing in the distance. She could see the alcohol drip down from his hair onto the back of his shirt. Armani. Their grandfather would hyperventilate if he knew that Minseok was wearing something other than from their family tailor.

“Care to explain why you’re here and not at home drinking wine with Grandfather?” Sohee finally began and she saw Minseok’s temple twitch. “Because you know, he always seems to think it’s my fault when you don’t turn up for family meetings. He wanted to talk about the new investment policies with you. Inheritance shit. _Your_ inheritance shit. Why do you always bail out on him when it comes to your duty?”

“My duty?” Minseok sounded incredulous. He turned around to face her and looked like he was about to throw up. “My duty? The one that I didn’t get ask to be born into? You know I’m not interested in whatever they’re trying to make me do, so why the hell are you becoming Grandfather’s kind little stooge and dragging me back home? Why the fuck is Grandfather in the States anyway?”

Sohee couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Her brother had the best opportunities in the world because he was prospective heir and she had nothing because she was a girl. Their grandfather gave her limited edition bags and three cars for her birthdays but would never let her become anything higher than a director of the board with no real duties. Because she didn’t have a fucking penis. And here was Minseok complaining that he didn’t want to be “born into duty”? Sohee felt the uncontrollable urge to throw her brother down into the pool that stretched out below them, teeming with half naked partiers and an inflatable drinks bar.

“He said he would come a month ago. Why don’t you ever pay attention to things that matter? This.” She waved an agitated arm around at Minseok’s house. “This doesn’t even contribute anything to your life. What the hell are you doing with your life, oppa?”

Minseok’s mouth was set in a steely line. He glared at her but Sohee held her gaze. She understood, she really did, but she also didn’t get why her brother never thought to think about her as well. Her only way to climb up was if Minseok became who their grandfather wanted him to be. If he didn’t, she would be exactly the sort of person she despised the most. Sohee despaired at the amount of things she couldn’t do without Minseok’s help. It was as if their grandfather had planned this out, to clip her wings before they could even grow. It was unfair, but she had no way of getting around this unless Minseok would grow up and actually do things for once.

“Living it the way I want.” He answered coldly and Sohee felt a shiver down her spine. Minseok flicked his glance away from her and leaned against the metal bannisters. “You should go home. Now.”

Sohee didn’t say a word as he moved towards her and pressed the key of one of his cars into her palm. Minseok gave her a conflicted look, one that seemed to be sad even, before he turned away again and waved a hand halfheartedly. Below them someone squealed before there was a loud splash, followed by laughing and more screaming. This was why Sohee hated parties. Minseok appeared to live for them, and it was taking him away from _them_ , the family he should have been focused on the most.

“Just go. I’ll see you at home.” She heard her brother say again, before he walked away. There was another splash, and Sohee stared at the ground, the key to Minseok’s Maserati digging sharply into her hand. It didn’t hurt, not when she realised that everything she had wanted to fight for was now over.

 

* * *

 

Kris wasn’t entirely awful at his university classes—he didn’t _enjoy_ academia per se, but he did well enough. It wasn’t easy to focus, though, when he returned to his classes without any real leads on what Feifei was hiding from him.

He found himself making lists on the corner of his notes during classes. Class was an easier endeavor for him than it was for some of his counterparts, because he’d had the privilege of moving to Canada in middle school, after his mother threatened his father with a second lawsuit. His mother’s side wasn’t rich—at least not in the way the Wangs were rich—but they had lawyers in the family, and social connections. It was probably the social connections that made Kris’s father fold and use the last of his fortunes set his estranged wife and son up in Canada. It was kind of funny, the way all these other families were run, that Kris’s father never seemed all that interested in him. Kris had heard his father insinuate countless times over the years that Kris wasn’t really his child, even though Kris looked just like him and photos of them at ages three through ten were indistinguishable. At any rate, he didn’t have to strain to tease out the tangled English sentences the way his friends did.

Would Feifei really go after Lu Han? Her set-up with Zhou Mi seemed like a done deal. Lu Han was probably a _better_ match for her—but if it were really an advantageous one, wouldn’t their parents have set it up years ago? That was how things worked in these circles; the whole idea of marriage was taken straight out of history. Marriage was about strategy and love could blossom between two people when they realized what the other had to offer. Lu Han’s father’s position in China’s judicial system wasn’t an inherited one, but it was China—people would look favorably upon the competent son of an esteemed colleague. There was no doubt in Kris’s mind that Feifei would inherit her father’s empire. All he wanted for himself was a _chunk_ of it, and he’d have to find another way to better his own situation. So if Lu Han and Feifei were a unit—would that be advantageous?

Kris looked at his notes. The margins were lined with sloppy Chinese characters, now, and the English scribbles on the page barely covered the material the professor was going over in front of the class. In the long run, though, Kris needed to out-maneuver Feifei more than he needed to get an A. His GPA would survive—his position in society might not.

He needed to find a natural way to initiate conversation with her. He wasn’t fool enough to think she was actually interested in him—though she should be, come on—but he had a feeling that she thought he was. He could use that to his advantage, probably. And if they made out again—well, sacrifices had to be made in order to get ahead.

He knew Feifei kept a study carrel on reserve at the library, so he headed in that direction and texted her _need to talk to you._ He needed to invent a reason to talk to her, fast. What would she buy?

_I’m studying_ , she texted back. Kris could hear her annoyed done loud and clear across the screen.

_Your dad called me._ Kris decided that line would be the most effective, and the least likely for her to follow up with. _Can we talk?_

_Fine._

Kris grinned. He’d have to be fast thinking, but at least now he had an angle to approach this from.

He went up to Feifei’s study carrel in the library after she texted him the number and knocked lightly on the door. This floor of the library was nearly empty in the middle of the day, and her study carrel was tucked away in a row of other carrels behind several rows of bookcases. The door opened, and Feifei glared up at him.

“What is it?” she demanded.

“Can we talk?” he asked. They stared each other down for a long moment, before she finally rolled her eyes and scooted back the desk chair. Kris let himself into the study carrel and watched as Feifei closed the door, the latch locking quietly into place. It was a small room, intended for one person, and Kris sat down on the desk, careful to avoid her stacks of papers. Barely a foot of space was between them, and Kris felt his pulse pick up slightly.

He gestured to her computer. Photos were on screen, of her and some girls out at a bar. “Still hanging out with them, huh?”

Feifei looked at the picture. “They’re my friends, idiot.”

Kris looked at the smiling faces. Other people wondered why Feifei mingled below her social class, but Kris thought it was interesting, seeing another side of her. “Jia is pretty,” he observed, pointing toward the girl next to her in the photo. “She looks better now that she got rid of that bright pink hair.”

Feifei closed the laptop. “Don’t even think about going for Jia.” She smiled. “Besides, Jia doesn’t really offer you any advantages, does she? Middle class doesn’t suit your needs.”

Kris looked at the closed laptop and then back to Feifei’s simmering glare. “Maybe not long-term,” he said.

Feifei laughed. “You’re despicable.”

Silence fell over the little cubicle. An impasse. He wasn’t any closer to getting information about what she was up to, but she hadn’t kicked him out yet, either.

“Your dad asked me to help you with that project you’re working on,” he bluffed. Worth a shot, anyway.

Feifei’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t lie to me, Wu Yifan. There is no project.” She leaned back in her chair, crossing one leg over the other and looking terrifyingly intimidating. Kris’s pulse ran a little faster.

“Fine,” he said. He had a couple of different ways he could go with this, but he was distracted by the number of inches of bare thigh that Feifei had revealed when she crossed her legs and her skirt rode up. Might as well take that route, anyway. “Look—I had to see you.”

Feifei smiled slowly, and Kris suddenly felt like a fly trapped in her web. “I still think you’re lying,” she said softly.

“You’re the only one playing any games here, jie,” he reminded her.

She stood up and suddenly the carrel seemed even smaller than it did a moment before. She crossed her arms over her chest and took a step forward. They weren’t touching, but they were so close that if either of them moved at all, they would be pressed up against each other. Kris liked that idea.

“You know what’s funny?” she said, voice barely above a whisper. “You come in here trying to play my game against me, but there’s no way for you to win here.”

“There’s not?” Kris smirked. “Seems like I’m getting what I came for.”

She leaned in closer. Still not touching him. It took all his willpower to remain perfectly still.

“That’s because you’re always thinking short-term. If you could think long-term,” she held his gaze as she slid the buckle of his belt open, “You would walk away right now.”

Kris’s brain was headed into very fuzzy territory now. She was working at the button of his jeans. “Why?” he managed to say.

She smiled. “Oh, didi,” she said, “If you let me do what you want me to do—well, sweetheart, then I’ve already won.”

Somewhere in the very, very deep recesses of Kris’s intuition, he was afraid that she was right. But that was buried deep under a thousand other thoughts that he was winning, he was winning, she was crazy, and he _needed_ to stay.

Later, when he left the library, he looked back at the windows of the fourth floor and smiled to himself. It was a warm, sunny afternoon. And he was quite sure that _he_ had won this battle.

 

* * *

 

Meng Jia got out of class and stood outside on the sidewalk for a moment, taking in the warmth of the sunshine and the fresh air. Being trapped in classes again after such a short vacation was unfortunate, really, but she had a GPA to maintain. She’d be graduating soon and heading back to China, trying to keep herself afloat there if she couldn’t find a job here in America to sponsor a visa for her.

She texted Feifei and headed toward the library. She was worried about her best friend, who had been in an odd mood since she returned from Shanghai. They’d gone out for drinks with Cao Lu the night before, and it was like Feifei was barely present. Whenever Jia asked, she only got vague answers. In America as much as in China, the lives of the elite were shrouded in fog. Even if it was your best friend.

Jia herself was not rich—not in the way Feifei was—and had gotten herself to the US by her own academic hustle. Back home, she never would have been friends with Feifei, or some of her other good friends, like Zitao. But America had a way of simultaneously flattening out and magnifying the differences. She and Feifei met when Jia was a freshman and Feifei was a junior appointed to helping the incoming Chinese students adjust to life in the American university, and they’d hit it off instantaneously. Jia was careful, though, because she knew that people in the world kept track of China’s socialites like Feifei, especially in recent years, when her name wasn’t so often wiped from the internet as she prepared to take her place in the family business. Jia had learned all kinds of things just from being near Feifei.

She decided to wait outside the library, because of the sunshine, and sat herself on a bench. She looked up just as someone very tall walked by. In the glimpse she got, she wondered if this was Feifei’s elusive stepbrother, whom Feifei had warned Jia to stay far away from. But he was gone so quickly, and Jia didn’t get a good look.

Feifei came outside a few minutes later, looking very distracted. She put on her sunglasses as soon as she stepped out the door and walked up to Jia.

“Let’s go,” she said brusquely.

“Is everything okay?” Jia asked, standing up and grabbing her bag.

Feifei frowned. “My stepbrother came to talk to me,” she said, pushing her glasses up higher on her nose. “He leaves a bad taste in my mouth.”

Jia linked her arm through Feifei’s and pulled her along. “Don’t think about it,” she said, “It’s a gorgeous day, and it’s still early. We could drive to the beach?”

Feifei’s nose wrinkled. “My stepmother keeps pointing out how tan I’ve gotten.”

Jia rolled her eyes. It always took a good few weeks for Feifei to return to normal after she went home. “You’re in _California_ , for goodness’ sakes! Tan is the look here! Embrace it. Cultural exchange and all that.” She smiled, but Feifei didn’t perk up at all.

Feifei sighed. “I’m really tired, okay? Sorry, it’s just—” She stopped and pulled her arm out from Jia’s and pressed her fingers to her temples. “I’ve got so much on my mind and I feel like maybe I’m way out of my league here. Maybe I’m just fooling myself. Maybe I _won’t_ win—”

“Feifei.” Jia grabbed her shoulder and forced her to look up. “You’re not. There. Anymore. Breathe.”

Feifei started wringing her hands. Jia knew that Feifei never allowed herself this much vulnerability in front of nearly anyone, except maybe Zhou Mi. Zhou Mi had a tendency to text Jia when he couldn’t visit America, just to make sure that Feifei was okay. There was a kind of privilege in seeing Feifei’s fear, even if Jia never got to know the details of what caused it.

Feifei took several deep breaths and pinched the bridge of her nose. “You’re right. You’re right. It’s just my stepbrother. But now I _own_ him.” A very dark look crossed her eyes and Jia took an unconscious step backwards. But the look passed quickly.

“Come on,” Jia said, looping her arm through Feifei’s again. “If not the beach, then let’s do something else fun. Zitao and Sehun invited me to go to an arcade with them, and I am not kidding.”

Feifei laughed. Jia really would go to the arcade—she was _killing_ Zitao at skee ball lately and she needed to overtake Sehun at air hockey because he’d figured out this really weird way to flick his wrist and had won their last ten games that way—but she couldn’t really imagine Feifei there. Still, it was worth a shot.

“If you have to hang out with younger guys all the time,” Feifei implored, “Can’t it be someone else? What about Zhang Yixing? He’s only a year younger than you.”

“Zhang Yixing is really nice, but I don’t think he likes me very well.” Jia wasn’t even going to bother with defending Zitao and Sehun. They were kind of hard to defend, after all, because they were ridiculous—but they were her buddies. It was the only way to describe their relationship.

“What? Why wouldn’t he like you?” Feifei held up a hand and started counting. “You’re fun, you’re kind, you’re pretty, you’re smart, and you’re my friend.” She said everything so aggressively, Jia couldn’t help but laugh at her.

“Isn’t he kind of a prude?” Jia asked. It wasn’t that Jia was _loose_ but she always thought there was a faint air of disapproval around Zhang Yixing whenever they were in the same room. He tended to stake out one corner and stay in it. Not that Jia had had that many opportunities to observe—she generally wasn’t invited to the most elite parties, but she had been to a few of the parties thrown by some of the guys in their circles, like Chanyeol, who tended to invite the entire university.

Feifei waved a hand. “He’s just weird. He’s more fun in smaller settings, I promise. If I think someone’s fun, you know they must be.”

Jia gave her a sly grin. “The arcade is really fun.”

“Zhang Yixing can go _with_ you to the arcade.” She gave Jia an odd look. “You really shouldn’t be going to the arcade, anyway—Jia, you’re graduating in a matter of months.”

“Yeah, I know,” Jia laughed. “I’m the one who is graduating, after all.”

“But you don’t have a job lined up.”

They reached Feifei’s car—an Audi that was considered the “cheap car for driving around town.” Feifei stopped before Jia had a chance to walk around to the passenger’s side.

“We have an internship at our company,” she said. “You should apply for it. You’re bilingual in English and Mandarin, and a PR major—we’re looking to branch into more markets, anyway. You wouldn’t believe how much shipping is done to and from China these days, and it just keeps getting bigger. You’d be a good candidate.”

Jia was too stunned to say anything. She had never once in her life suggested such a thing to Feifei. She was very careful to make sure that none of her rich friends saw her as trying to use them to climb her way up the social ladder. She wanted to better her life, of course, and maybe those connections would be useful later, but there was something fundamentally dishonest about developing a friendship with only what they could do for you in mind. Connections were supposed to be reciprocal. That’s how her father had built their modest but successful family restaurant business. Good connections built on solid, reciprocal relationships.

“I—I don’t know what to say,” Jia stammered out. This opportunity could be career-defining. If she could get hired on at the Wang corporation, she could change everything. She could pay for her father to finally remodel the main restaurant. Maybe even open the more expensive restaurant he was always daydreaming about.

“Just apply,” Feifei said. “I’ll send you all the information.”

“Okay,” Jia agreed. She bit back a smile. Maybe she’d really be okay after graduating.

 

* * *

 

“Feifei didn’t invite you?”

Huang Zitao pulled himself sleekly out of the pool as Jia watched from the bench on the side of the pool complex. Sehun sat next to her, and she didn’t even have to turn to know he was smirking. He jabbed his bony elbow into her side and Jia averted her eyes from Zitao’s bathing suit to his face.

“Feifei never invites me. She says those parties are awful and she hates them, and that she’s saving me a big headache by not inviting me.”

She was referring to the big, almost weekly parties Zitao and the other rich Chinese kids in the area attended with their grotesquely expensive cars. Feifei hadn’t even mentioned this one, but Jia didn’t expect her to.

Zitao came over to where they sat waiting and rubbed at his hair with a towel. They spent more time waiting around for him at the pool these days than anywhere else, but that was to be expected when trainers back in China put him on the shortlist for some of the major world swimming competitions—not the Olympics. Not yet. Anyway, Jia was fairly sure she had a permanent chlorine high from waiting around for Zitao to swim laps. Sehun had started bringing books.

“That’s stupid. You have to come.” Zitao started toweling off his torso and this time, Jia jabbed Sehun with her own elbow. “I just got this new—”

Zitao went on to describe his fancy car with a fancy name, which Jia tuned out. She only tuned back in when Zitao said,

“And your best friend’s,” he put air quotes around best friend, “stepbrother will be there, and you should definitely come check this guy out.”

Sehun snorted. “Zitao has a crush on him.”

“I don’t.” Zitao shot a scathing glare in Sehun’s direction, who seemed unaffected by it, and nodded emphatically at Jia.

“I thought you were dating that Krystal girl,” Jia asked Zitao.

Sehun snorted again. “That was me. Krystal would _never_ go out with Zitao.”

“Why not?” Zitao demanded.

“Dude. You’re not cool.”

Zitao rolled his eyes. “Do you _want_ to go to the big party with all the fancy cars, or not? How do you plan to get your Korean self in without me?”

“If you don’t take me, I’ll just call Lu Han,” Sehun shrugged, picking up his book again and leafing through to find his page. “I don’t need you.” Zitao looked thoroughly irritated, so rather than listen to him go on a huge diatribe, Jia interjected herself into the conversation again.

“Okay, fine. Say I go. Everyone will know I’m not really one of you.” Jia wasn’t sure she had anything suitable to wear, not around girls who could pick out fake designer from across the room. Jia could do the same thing, but the difference was that these girls were the kind who threw designer clothes on the floor when they changed. Jia hung hers up carefully, in garment bags.

“We’ll go late, and they’ll already be plastered,” Zitao said with a wave of his hand. “Come on, Jia. You know you want to see if the evil stepbrother lives up to Feifei’s stories.”

Jia chewed her cheek for a minute, trying to decide. She’d heard a lot about this stepbrother. A lot about these parties. And always with Feifei’s sincere, heartfelt warning— _“It’s not fun. I only go because I have to. I swear.”_

“If you don’t make out with the stepbrother, Zitao will,” Sehun said.

Zitao made a noise of disgust. “One, I hate you. Two, I’m going to go put on clothes. Jia, you’re going to this damn party. I want you to see my new car.”

With that, Zitao walked off toward the locker room entrance. Jia and Sehun watched him go.

“You know, Jia,” Sehun observed, “The way you look at him isn’t very big-sisterly.”

“Never said I was his sister,” Jia teased. Mostly just to get a rise out of Sehun; she liked her platonic relationship with Zitao. That didn’t mean she couldn’t look.

“Why don’t you ever look at me that way?” Sehun asked, mocking hurt. “I wear these skinny jeans just for you.” He gestured to the lower half of his body and grinned. Now Jia rolled her eyes.

“I sincerely doubt they’re _just_ for me.”

 

* * *

 

Jia waited outside her apartment for Zitao to come pick her up. She lived off campus now with Hyerim, a girl a few years younger than she, who had grown up in California and found a decent place for them. It wasn’t the sort of place Zitao would normally bring a car the price of a small island, which he’d made a point to tell her over the phone, but Jia had simply hung up on him and gone downstairs to wait.

The car peeled into view and parked in front of her. The passenger window rolled down and Sehun and Zitao looked out at her.

“Damn, Jia,” Zitao said from the driver’s side, looking her up and down.

“This car only has two seats, so you’ll have to sit in my lap,” Sehun said with a broad grin.

Jia rolled her eyes. “I can _see_ the back seat, Sehun. And I also think that that’s where _you’re_ going to sit, and you’re going to let me have the passenger seat.”

“Fine,” Sehun muttered. “Only because your dress is so short. Don’t want you flashing the whole neighborhood trying to climb back there.”

As ridiculous as it was for a fancy sports car to make it so difficult to get into the backseat, at least it _had_ one and she didn’t have to deal with making Sehun’s fantasies come true for the next fifteen minutes. He climbed into the backseat and Jia slid into his vacated spot.

“You actually look better than most of the other girls who are normally there,” Zitao said as he pulled back onto the road. “Money can’t buy style.” He smoothed the lapels of his jacket and winked at her.

“Why do I hang out with you guys?” Jia asked.

“You like our dashing good looks and winning personalities,” Sehun offered.

“You can’t resist the unresolved three-way sexual tension,” Zitao chimed in.

Jia sighed. “Gross.”

“It’s okay, Jia, we won’t tell,” Sehun said happily. “Ooh, we’re getting close. I just saw a—” He named some kind of car and Jia tuned out.

A few minutes later Zitao pulled into a parking lot teeming with other cars. The cars in this one parking lot could probably revive the economy of a small poor nation. Jia climbed out of the car and steadied herself on her stilettos, trying to swallow down the nerves she felt. She was an impostor, really, pretending at the kind of wealth Zitao and his other friends had been handed. For every rich young man in China, there were thousands of poor ones. Jia was caught somewhere in the middle of the social ladder, trying to make herself content with who she was and what she had.

Sehun climbed out and stuffed his hands into the pockets of his skinny jeans—a miracle he managed to, really, given how tight they were—and let out a low whistle as he looked around. “Is that Victoria?” he asked Zitao, nodding in the direction of a well-dressed woman getting out of a car across the parking lot.

Zitao came around to their side of the car and looked. “Yeah. Damn, that’s a new car. Gift from her fiance, I’d guess.”

Sehun looked down at Jia. “Aw, Jia looks nervous.”

“I’m not nervous,” Jia retorted. But she latched herself onto Zitao’s arm, anyway, and he didn’t say anything.

They walked into the party which, true to Zitao’s word, was filled with already-drunk people. Jia recognized a few of them from university classes, but no one she knew by name. She tightened her grip on Zitao’s arm, embarrassed that she was nervous.

“Just fake it,” Zitao hissed in her ear. “No one knows you, so you have nothing to hide. They’re too drunk to care where you’re from, okay?”

Sehun grabbed her hand and pulled her in the direction of the dance floor, abandoning Zitao to go find drinks. This was a relief for Jia—if nothing else, she knew how to dance. Out of the guys she hung out with, she preferred dancing with Sehun. The others either lacked rhythm (Heechul), got too excited (Jackson), or got too touchy-feely (Taecyeon). Sehun was the right mix of all those elements, and on a dance floor she clearly had the advantage over the stuffy princess-types already at the party. Then again, they might just assume she was a slut. She stopped Sehun from winding his arm around her waist and walked back out off the dance floor, leaving Sehun to get acquainted with the numerous young individuals still dancing, and found Zitao standing at the crowded bar. His back was to her, and another very tall guy stood next to him.

“Zitao,” she said, wedging herself between Zitao and the taller guy. “It’s been like twenty minutes, what the hell?”

“Sorry,” he said, handing her a drink. There was a strange, suspicious glint in his eyes. “This is Kris.” He gestured to the guy on the other side of Jia.

She turned around and looked up. Here was Fei’s mythical stepbrother, about whom Jia had heard nearly a hundred unflattering stories. He was taller than Jia expected. Strong jawline. Nice eyes. She felt like the room was buzzing around her.

“This is Jia,” Zitao said to him, putting his hand on Jia’s back and leaning into her space.

Kris gestured between the two of them. “Are you guys…”

“Just friends,” Jia said, holding Kris’s gaze.

“With benefits,” Zitao amended, earning himself a sharp jab in his stomach from Jia’s elbow. “I’m kidding,” he said weakly. Kris laughed, and Jia felt herself smile all too widely. Kris nodded, turning back to his glass of alcohol, and Jia could _feel_ Zitao’s eyes burning a hole in the side of her head, but she had no interest in turning around to get a good look at the smirk surely growing across his face.

“Ignore Zitao,” Jia said to Kris, making a point to ignore Zitao herself. “He thinks if he says it enough, it will come true.”

Kris looked at her again, this time with a small smile that felt a little bit like a victory to her. “Aren’t you a little out of his league?” he asked. “Zitao usually leaves with girls a little—well, trashier—”

“Funny,” Zitao cut in. “Leaving is different than _bringing_ , okay?”

“I’m just kidding,” Kris said, his smile a little wider. “I’ll buy you a drink, since your date hasn’t.” He gestured for the bartender and this time Jia did turn around and give Zitao a look. Zitao just rolled his eyes.

“He brought two dates, so his attention is a little divided,” Jia explained, patting her hand on top of Zitao’s.

“Sehun doesn’t count,” Kris laughed. “You’re prettier than Sehun, so he should get you a drink first.”

“I’m right here,” Zitao cut in, “And don’t let Sehun hear you say that.”

Kris got her the drink and passed it over, their fingers brushing in the exchange. Jia felt a spark of electricity when their hands touched and tried to keep her face impassive. Based on Feifei’s stories, Kris wasn’t someone she should be messing around with, even for fun. But it wouldn’t hurt to talk to him.

“Where _is_ Sehun?” Zitao asked. Jia let her eyes flick away from Kris’s and she slowly turned back to face Zitao.

“I left him dancing with some guy.” She gestured vaguely toward the dance floor and Zitao craned his neck, scanning the crowd.

“You can’t just leave him alone here,” Zitao groaned. Looking annoyed, he went off to retrieve Sehun, which left Jia and Kris alone at the bar. She moved so she squarely faced the bar, not turned toward Kris or turned away from him, and took a couple of careful sips of her drink. She was very aware of how close her bare arm was to Kris’s, and he hadn’t moved away, either.

“Not trying to be creepy, or anything,” Kris said, and Jia looked up at him again, “But based on some of the stuff Feifei says about you—we don’t, like, talk about you a lot or anything—we really don’t talk that much at all—anyway, I wouldn’t think this party would be your scene.”

Jia bit the tip of her tongue between her teeth and tried to figure out what he meant. It could be a jab at her lack of wealth, or it could mean something else—it was probably the former. If so, she shouldn’t stay around flirting with the guy. The last thing she wanted to be seen as was some easy lay.

“Sorry I’m not up to your standards,” she said sweetly. She took her drink, gave Kris a measured smile, and walked away from the bar. She’d find Zitao and Sehun and they’d dance and go wax eloquent about cars and then go home. That was all she’d really expected out of coming here, anyway. She walked away, glad she’d put on her highest heels and tightest dress, so the last thing the guy would see was a reminder that he’d never get to touch her ass. Which was a terrific ass, and she hardly needed Sehun or Zitao to remind her of that.

But before she could fully wander off into the party, Kris caught up with her, coming up to her side without getting too close. “Hey—sorry, that wasn’t what I meant. Seriously.”

Jia stopped walking and looked up at him, searching his eyes for sincerity. He did seem sorry.

“What did you mean, then?”

He rubbed the back of his neck with his palm and shrugged. “I don’t know—whenever pictures of you pop up, you look _cool_ , okay? We’ve got a lot of rich kids at this party,” he gestured around the crowded club, “But a lot of them are weird, anyway. I thought you were more, I don’t know, the kind of girl to go to see bands before they suddenly hit it big, to know where the best raves are—that’s all I meant.”

Jia weighed her options. She’d still be better off going to find Sehun and Zitao, but she was—intrigued. “Feifei warned me about you,” she said slowly, still trying to make up her mind what she wanted.

To her surprise, Kris paled a little at that. “What did she say?” he asked.

“Nothing you’d probably want to hear about yourself,” Jia told him. It didn’t seem worth it to go into detail about how Feifei thought he was a selfish, egotistic, gold-digging son of an expert gold-digger.

Kris looked around the room for a moment before his gaze settled squarely on her again. “I’m not going to say anything bad about your best friend,” he said, “But you should hear me out. You’ve never heard my side of things, after all.”

Jia had a feeling she should say no. Feifei might construe this as a betrayal. But—well, damn it, Kris was hot and was Jia just supposed to ignore that? It _wouldn’t_ hurt anyone if she just listened to the guy.

“You have twenty minutes to explain yourself,” she told him. She wasn’t quite able to keep a smile from lifting the corners of her mouth, and he saw it and smiled.

“Okay,” he agreed. “Just twenty minutes. Want to go for a walk?”

She nodded, and they headed for the door. He rested his hand gently on her upper back, and Jia thought she might be willing to do a lot more than just listen.


	5. 夙夜在公

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Feifei finds out about Kris and Jia, Zitao’s swimming career looks like it won’t be heading to the Olympics until Kris steps in, Lu Han finds something horrible hidden in the basement of the family mansion, and Feifei is ready to put her plan into action.

夙夜在公  
_in the early dawn we are with the prince_

 

 

Lu Han handed his car keys to the valet and started walking into the club just as Kris was leaving. Kris didn’t see him, though, and Lu Han spun on his heels to check out the girl he was with. It looked to be Meng Jia, a girl Lu Han only knew of because she hung out with Wang Feifei. Well, that was certainly interesting.

He found Huang Zitao standing with Oh Sehun at the bar inside the club. They would know.

“Hey, guys,” Lu Han said, clapping them both into hugs as a greeting. “Did I just see Kris leaving with Meng Jia?”

Zitao’s eyebrows lifted. “They _left_ together? Already?”

Sehun let out a low whistle. “Jia is impressive. I could learn so much from her. Hey, do you think she would fool around with me if I asked her to teach me new techniques?”

Lu Han laughed, and decided not to bring up his suspicions about Kris and his stepsister. Intrigue tended to go over Zitao’s head, and Sehun would find it too amusing. “From the way things looked,” Lu Han told Sehun, “I think you’d have to let Kris join in on your lessons.”

Sehun guffawed and grabbed Zitao’s shoulder. “I’ll leave that adventure to Zitao here.”

“Dude, all I said was that he was good-looking, and you’ve turned it into some gross love triangle—”

“Am I not your best friend?” Sehun asked.

“No,” Zitao said, glaring at him.

“Do I not know how your filthy mind works?” Sehun asked.

“No. There’s a lot of projection going on here, actually.”

Lu Han left them to their little spat and turned to order a drink. That’s when he caught someone out of the corner of his eye, and he paused before turning fully. But she’d already seen him, and was smiling.

“Still snooping on other people’s private lives, Lu Han?”

He met her eyes. Zhang Liyin looked like the perfect heiress, smiling at him over her cocktail. Lu Han resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

“It’s a good thing you’re above reproach,” he told her pleasantly. “Still keeping your Korean boy toy on a short leash?”

Liyin paused, but didn’t react.

“I’ll let him know you said that,” she said, tilting her drink in her direction. Lu Han, glowering, got his drink from the bartender and wished he hadn’t bothered to come here tonight. These parties were hit-and-miss, anyway. But he needed a distraction. Zhang Liyin was not one.

“What are you doing here?” Lu Han asked her. Too blunt. He should know better. But he just felt so restless and unsettled, it was like he was transforming into a different person.

“Song Qian’s fiance is in business with my family,” Zhang Liyin said, nodding to a table across the room. Lu Han turned and saw Victoria sitting there with a man’s arm around her shoulders. They were laughing. “I like to make certain transactions in person.”

He knew that Zhang Liyin had more and more power in her family corporation, but actually witnessing it bothered him. The Zhangs were a tightly knit network. Stable. Lu Han’s father talked about them like they were his opponents.

“Back to school, then?” Liyin said in a faux-pleasant tone Lu Han knew too well. “It’s incredible how much free time you have.”

“I’m stressed,” Lu Han spat out. Honestly, if he could do what he really wanted right now, he would bolt. Buy a cheap car—a legitimately cheap car—and drive into the deep wilderness of the USA. See what happened to him.

“You know, Lu Han,” Liyin said, sliding out of her seat. She was short, but stood on very high heels, and had an intimidating presence. “It’s normal enough for families to carry on tradition, and for sons to carry on their fathers’ legacies.” She paused and set her glass on the bar next to him, her eyebrows drawn together in consideration. “My family was into horse racing for a while. The whole idea there is bloodlines. A great racehorse is more likely to produce offspring that will be great racehorses. The trouble is sometimes, genetic defects don’t present themselves until the gene pool gets shallow. The racehorse you thought would be great turns out to be as rotten inside as what its father was hiding all along.”

Lu Han very, very carefully kept his face blank. He knew a warning when he heard one. If the Zhangs knew about his father, how many other people knew? And he had no way of guessing if Liyin knew because the Zhangs were paying up, or because they weren’t.

“Why are you telling me this?” He tried to sound irritated, but he heard fear seep into his tone. He hoped Liyin missed it.

She shrugged her shoulders. “Just a word of caution,” she said, nonchalant. “Don’t invest in horse racing.”

She walked away. Lu Han ordered another drink.

 

* * *

 

Twenty minutes of talking turned into an hour, turned into overnight, turned into Jia spending most of her free time at Kris’s place. Kris couldn’t quite make sense of this turn of events. He’d originally been interested in Jia because she was close to Feifei, and he figured he could use that to his advantage.

But the thing was, Jia was really cool. She was nice, and he found himself talking to her about things he hadn’t said aloud to anyone in years. Stupid stuff, like his childhood dream of becoming a professional basketball player, or the playground bully who beat him up when he was eight, or things they both remembered about their freshman year of college, when they hadn’t known each other but were in the same places at the same time.

And she was mind-blowing in bed, but that wasn’t the main reason he kept calling her.

(Okay, it was. But only, like, a majority of 51%.

Okay, more like 65%).

But thanks to Jia he didn’t find himself painfully aroused by the mere thought of his step-sister, which made Jia an antidote to a particularly powerful poison. And Jia was happy to talk about Feifei if he asked about her, framing it as “I can’t connect with my stepsister.” And Jia was just—well, he liked her. They agreed to keep things quiet, because Jia said she wasn’t ready to deal with whatever disapproval Feifei would throw their way. And Kris didn’t tell her, but he wasn’t quite sure how people would react to the two of them. If anything, Kris knew he should be pursuing someone like Zhang Liyin, with a substantial inheritance. Not Meng Jia.

“I should go visit Zitao today,” Jia said one Saturday morning, frowning at her cellphone. “He doesn’t show it really, but he’s a mess with all this training he has going on.”

Kris slung an arm around her waist to stop her from getting out of bed. “We can go together,” he said, feeling oddly warm and fuzzy about everything. He hadn’t had a real girlfriend in years. Even if they were secret, he liked the way she kept his loneliness at bay. She was wearing his t-shirt, and it made him feel even more relaxed and pleased.

“Okay,” Jia agreed. She set her phone aside and looked at him, suddenly serious. “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“Feifei told me to apply for the PR internship at the Wang Corporation here in LA.” She hesitated, searching his face for a reaction. Kris kept very still. “So I applied, and they’ve offered it to me. I don’t know if I should accept it or not though.”

He sat up. He hadn’t thought about telling Jia to apply for that internship, himself. He was a bit distracted with—their other activities. But now that she brought it up, all the little pieces of information he’d picked up about Jia over the last couple of weeks fell into place, and he realized she’d be a perfect choice. Not to mention that her working there would put her, Feifei, and himself all in the same building for a number of hours each week. He could surely use that to his advantage.

“Of course you should,” he told her. “That’s career-defining.”

“I know it.” Jia sighed and started picking at her nails. “It’s just—it’s a big step, you know? Maybe I’m not cut out for something like this.”

Kris put his palm against her face and forced her to look up at him. She looked really innocent and unharmed. A part of him wanted to protect her. A bigger part of him wanted to teach her how to survive in the world she was heading for. “Hey,” he said, quirking a smile, “Listen to me, okay?”

She looked skeptical, but she nodded for him to go on.

“My mom used to tell me,” he said, “that I’d better look out for myself, because no one else in the world was going to do it for me.” He could almost hear his mother’s words echoing in the room, like it was fifteen years ago and they were living in near-poverty in Guangzhou. “When someone gives you an opportunity like this,” he continued, “You take it. You sink your teeth into it and you don’t look back.”

Jia’s expression had faded into something Kris couldn’t read. She reached up and took his hand in hers, pressing their palms together.

“Not everyone can do that, you know.” She had a very strange look on her face, one that scared him a little bit. He curled his fingers around her hand, just to emphasize his point.

“ _You_ can. Okay? Don’t look back. Don’t let anyone get in your way.” He knew his every word was too harsh, but he could hear his father’s voice in the room, too— _this little bastard won’t amount to much!_ And then he’d laugh.

The doorbell rang before Jia responded. “I’ll get it,” she said softly, and climbed out of bed.

“Jia,” he called out. She stopped at the door of the room and looked back at him.

“I’ll take the internship,” she said with a small smile. “Don’t worry.”

 

* * *

 

Feifei decided to head over to Kris’s place on a Saturday morning, to give him a thorough (verbal) dressing-down before he started his job at the company’s Los Angeles branch the next week. She didn’t want him screwing anything up for her, and with her graduate classes she didn’t have quite the presence at work that she really wanted to. Her father was worried about Kris starting, too, and had called her personally to make sure that she was going to “look out for her brother.” It had taken a lot of resolve for Feifei not to snap when he said that.

Kris’s townhouse was located in a polished, well to-do neighborhood complex. Feifei parked her car on the street and took a look at herself in the mirror behind the sun shade. She had dark circles forming under her eyes. Last time she skyped with Zhou Mi, he suggested she check herself into a spa. Like she had time. Tracking down evidence of corruption was a full-time task, after all, and she was barely making any headway.

She got out of the car and slammed the door too hard. Some birds took flight out of a nearby tree. Huffing, Feifei walked up to the door of Kris’s townhouse and rang the doorbell, pushing the button in several times. She heard the sound of someone rushing down the stairs, and then the door opened.

Jia stood on the other side. Feifei couldn’t keep her eyes from growing round as she stood there, speechless.

A blush bloomed on Jia’s cheeks. She was wearing a shirt that clearly belonged to Kris, and she hugged her arms around herself, smiling nervously.

“I didn’t realize it was you,” she said.

Feifei couldn’t bring herself to say anything. She was too shocked to even be angry. The only clear emotion she could tease out was worry. Jia was starting on at the company shortly after Kris, for one, and it wouldn’t look good if they were flirty. Not to mention that she didn’t trust Kris.

He appeared behind Jia then. Feifei held Jia’s gaze, then looked up at him. A lot was said in that silent space while they just looked at each other. Triumph in his eyes, as he guessed what might have happened if Jia weren’t there. Feifei hoped her deep disapproval reached its way through his thick skull. If he used Jia, there would be hell to pay. Feifei would make sure of it.

“Sorry to interrupt,” Feifei said, measuring each word out equally on her tongue. “But I need to discuss a few things with Yifan.”

“Yeah, come in.” Kris motioned her inside, and Jia stepped back. Feifei came inside and stopped to take off her shoes. Kris didn’t have extra slippers, so she stood in her bare feet on the cold hardwood floor, the three of them still too silent for comfort.

“I’ll go get ready,” Jia said, gesturing vaguely toward the second floor. Then she disappeared up the stairs, leaving Kris and Feifei there in the hallway.

“I know what you’re going to say,” Kris began.

“You should know better than most men,” Feifei said very quietly, so that Jia wouldn’t hear, “That a woman will turn vicious to protect whatever she loves. Your mother and I have one thing in common, and it’s this.”

Feifei was speaking very softly now, and she could see Kris’s face starting to pale. “Both of us would not hesitate to commit murder if it meant keeping our loved ones alive. You hurt Jia? I will come for you, and you will wish you had never even looked at her. Fuck around with me all you want—I let you. And I can’t stop Jia from seeing you. But in whatever way you hurt her, I will hurt you twice as much, and I won’t even flinch.”

A long silence followed. She watched fear cloud Kris’s eyes. And she waited.

“Understood,” he said. She was not sure he fully appreciated how serious she really was. But if he gave her any reason, he would find out.

They moved to the dining room and Feifei walked him through a massive number of documents her father thought he should have an understanding of before he started. The only decent thing Feifei could see about Kris was that he was, at least, pretty smart, and willing to do the work. Jia came into the kitchen and made soy milk and fancy egg sandwiches, which made the whole morning even weirder.

Jia set food in front of them and then slid into the spot at the table across from Feifei. “I decided to take the internship,” Jia said. Feifei looked up. Jia gave her a little smile, and she realized that this was an apology.

“Good,” Feifei said. She took a bite of the sandwich—it was really good. Feifei might have become a chef, if her life had given her a choice. She swallowed and looked back up at Jia. “We should go shopping. Find you something to wear for you first day.”

“I need to go see Zitao,” Jia said vaguely, a sudden shadow over her face. Feifei looked at Kris, and swore she saw a split second of irritation cross his face, but then it was gone.

“I’ll go see Zitao,” Kris said. “I’ve been meaning to talk to him, anyway. You two go shopping.” He smiled like he’d just made a great gesture of kindness, but Feifei wasn’t going to shoot it down. She looked at Jia expectantly.

“Okay,” Jia agreed. She smiled at Kris, and Feifei was forced with the reality that the two of them might actually like each other. She didn’t know if that was better or worse than them just being together for sex.

They finished their breakfasts and Jia and Feifei went to leave. When Jia was out the door, Feifei turned and gave Kris a clear, piercing look. He needed to remember. She was making a promise to him, right then. If he hurt Jia, she would hurt him.

“Good to see you, jie,” he said with a smile.

Feifei thought about slapping him across the face, but she left instead.

 

* * *

 

Zitao winced as the needle entered his muscle. Coach Li barely even blinked; he was used to this after years of training Chinese swimmers into the top ranks of competition. Zitao still wished he would at least _acknowledge_ the unpleasantness of sticking someone with a needle, instead of acting like it was mundane. Then again, maybe Zitao was just being dramatic.

“How much longer for this cycle?” Zitao asked as Coach Li gave him the last injection. It was a sunny day outside, but Coach Li’s office was cool and dark.

“Another month,” Coach Li answered. “You need to be clean before any of the competitions.”

Zitao nodded and pulled his shirt back on. International competitions didn’t look positively on athletes using any kind of help, but Zitao really didn’t have a choice. He’d narrowly missed the cutoff for a dozen competitions, with small enough of a margin that the Olympics wasn’t a complete pipe dream. Really, if he won two more competitions, he’d be on the team—but even that was a pretty far reach. His father had been encouraging him to pursue the Olympics since Zitao was small, but now that Zitao was unlikely to succeed, his father had started to question it. Zitao had loved wushu, but eventually devoted himself to swimming, since it might lead to more glory. It would be good for the family business if Zitao had a claim to glory before he took his father’s place—if he could get it. Zitao knew he would hate that job. But he couldn’t imagine turning it down, either.

“Here’s your schedule for next week,” Coach Li said, handing Zitao a color-blocked printout. “If you show up hungover once, you can skip the whole week.”

Zitao gritted his teeth and took the schedule. Morning and afternoon trainings, even longer on days when he didn’t have classes. It was a miracle he passed any of his classes.

“I’ll be there,” Zitao said. He left the office, feeling the uncomfortable tightness in his muscles that he knew was mostly his imagination. If his friends guessed about the steroids, they never said anything. Zitao didn’t really expect piercing intuition from any of them though, except maybe Jia, who was currently oblivious to anything that was not Kris. Anyway, he could guess what they’d say. Lu Han and Kris would barely bat an eye, Yixing would be concerned, Jia would tell him to be careful. Sehun might actually look down on him for it. Then again, what did Sehun have to prove?

Zitao got into his car, which was stuffy and hot from sitting out in the sun. He took out his cellphone and saw that his father had called him—it was around ten at night in Qingdao. Zitao sighed and dialed the number.

His father picked up and Zitao didn’t get a word in past “Hey, dad.” Then Zitao was pummeled with a lengthy speech about Zitao’s GPA and his future and living up to the family legacy and how worried his parents were about him and how he spent too much time on swimming and not enough on everything else, and since he wasn’t going to make it to the Olympics that meant swimming was just a hobby and Zitao needed to treat it as such. Bottom line: Zitao’s allowance for his swimming career was now being slashed in half.

Zitao couldn’t even say anything besides goodbye. He sat there, staring at his dark phone, for a long time.

 

* * *

 

It was funny how Zitao’s parents liked that he was a Class A swimmer, but didn’t seem to like it enough to fund his swimming career any further than they already had. He needed to get to them that it was a legit career choice, but Zitao wasn’t very good with his words and his parents were hardheaded. So here he was, sitting in the private room of the bar that he and the other kids frequented, drinking his heart out to the tune of sweet, sweet vodka. Nobody did seem to get that he _wanted_ to be a swimmer, not even Sehun, with whom he had a friendship so deep they would claim to sleep with each other and nobody would bat an eyelid.

“I mean, I’m this close.” Zitao gestured wildly. Kris nodded absently as he swirled his drink around. Beside them Jongin and Sehun were passed out on top of each other. “I’m _two_ fucking wins away from a place in the Olympic team. And my dad wants to pull the plug now so that I can _study_? What the fuck man.”

Kris nodded again, and Zitao downed the shot before sinking his head into his knees. His parents had always been supportive to the extent of indulgence. What Zitao wanted Zitao was able to get, most of the time, but now he realised that it was probably not that case. His parents wielded executive power, even if he was able to frolic around in the States partying and going to swim practice and buying a new car everytime he fancied it. Though, he thought, Kris might not be able to get it. Kris was the new addition, the one who had gotten rich overnight. There was no old money in China, but there was the burgeoning new rich that never received much respect. Kris was the stepson of the Wang family, sure, but Zitao was also sure that he didn’t truly understand how he was feeling.

“Why don’t you get a sponsor?” Kris asked after he had languished for a few minutes. Zitao looked up and groaned again. “All good athletes have someone backing them.”

“Yes, but I’m two wins away from the Olympic team, not an Olympic medal.” Zitao pointed out crossly. He wasn’t that stupid to know nothing about the swimming world. “You need to be able to be out there for the sponsors.”

Kris raised his glass lazily. “And won’t you be out there? If you want, we can make it happen.”

“We.” Zitao chewed on the word. “What do you mean, we?”

Kris put down his empty glass and sat up straighter. Either Jongin or Sehun let out a loud snore, before falling silent again. “We as in the Wang Corporation. My dad’s putting me in charge of our Social Responsibility department, and I’m sure sponsoring a budding athlete is very good for our image.”

Zitao wondered why he was calling Feifei’s father Dad, but held his tongue. The proposition was a tempting one, and Kris was right. It would benefit their social image, it would benefit him, and most of all it would stave off his financial worries. Zitao wasn’t willing to stoop to selling any of his cars yet. Besides, his parents would know and block the transactions anyway.

“If—” Zitao began and hedged, but Kris gave him an assuring look. The thing about Kris was that even though he didn’t belong by default, it actually felt like he was supposed to belong in their circle. So even though everyone knew that Feifei had a very low tolerance for him (and his mother), they didn’t mind being around him. Kris knew what to say and when to say it. “If I take it, what is going to happen?”

“We pay for your training, gear, everything. If you want, you get an allowance. If you don’t, use it as gas money or something.” Kris shrugged. “It won’t get you another one of your favourite Aston Martins, but you’ll get to train without worrying. Medication, whatever, we’re not going to care what you take. Just tell us and we’ll make it happen.”

Either Jongin or Sehun snored again. Zitao stared at his friends, asleep in a heap and unaware of the world in more ways than one, and exhaled a long, slow breath. He wanted this. He wanted to be at the Olympics, because he was only two steps away from achieving a dream that thousands wanted to reach for but couldn’t. China had over a billion people, and there Zitao was, able to reach the dream but barely. If Kris was able to help stretch his fingers a little longer, a little higher so that he could grab hold of it, why not?

“Don’t go back on your word.” He said it like a warning but the look in Kris’s eyes was more than enough for both of them to know that it was a concession.

“Don’t worry.” Kris held out his glass in a quiet toast, and Zitao knocked his empty shot glass against it. “I’ll never.”

 

* * *

 

One of Jia’s classes required her to assist a university club with their marketing. She’d been doing things like this for a few years, so she didn’t put much thought into it as she hurriedly packed her bag up to head for the campus gardening group’s meeting. She needed to develop a campaign to get more students to get involved with their on-campus gardens, and she had a few ideas, but mostly she was thinking about the internship she would be starting at the Wang corporation. Campus gardening was easy. The Wang Corporation was terrifying. No matter how much Kris insisted that she was made for the job, it was still terrifying.

She arrived at the fenced-in gardens on the edge of campus, suddenly realizing she was overdressed compared to the other students. It could be worse, at least she was in jeans, but even black jeans and clean tennis shoes were too nice compared to the others, who were all dressed in grubby old clothes so they could get down in the dirt without any second thoughts. Ah, well. Jia was here to meet with the club’s president and get interview quotes, not join in.

Seo Juhyun was the president of about fifteen clubs, so Jia had worked with her before. They had it down to a system that took less than ten minutes. Jia ran through her usual list of information, Seo Juhyun provided useful details without even being prompted. They finished up running through the plan for the gardening club so quickly that Jia was actually surprised when Juhyun walked away and started gardening again, and Jia realized she had a whole half hour free.

She almost started to head back, maybe stop and get a snack before class, but then someone at the far end of the garden caught her eye. She took a second look—it _was_ Zhang Yixing, diligently sifting the soil. Intrigued, Jia walked over to him, avoiding the other gardeners in her path.

“Do you work for this do-gooder image,” Jia said to him, suppressing a smile, “Or can you just not help it?”

Yixing looked up, startled, and stared at her with a blank expression for a moment. He looked vaguely at the dirt, then back at her. “I have to do this to graduate,” he said.

“Oh.” Jia felt a bit stupid, and thought about whether or not she should go. But Yixing suddenly started waving his hand in disagreement.

“I mean, I’d do this anyway,” he said in a rush. “But I’m a Civil Engineering major, so we have a bunch of club requirements and, well—” He spread his arms out and smiled at her. “Who doesn’t like fresh food?”

Jia resisted the urge to laugh at him. Zhang Yixing was a strange person. He rarely seemed to be on the same page as anyone else, and he definitely wasn’t on the same page as his wealthy friends, who wouldn’t know what to do if someone handed them a hoe meant for breaking up soil.

“Civil Engineering, huh?” she asked. She leaned against the low fence that surrounded the garden and watched as he turned back to his work, his back muscles appearing through the material of his t-shirt. He was really rather good-looking. Tended to get overshadowed by the other people he hung out with, which was unfortunate.

He turned so that he was facing her. “Well,” he said, “I’m supposed to inherit the family business, and we’re in mining. I don’t know if you know that much about mining in—well, basically everywhere—but it’s pretty dangerous. I’m hoping that when I’m in charge,” he paused while he picked a rock out of the dirt and threw it into a plastic bucket, “I can minimize the dangerous elements, make pay better, and keep skilled workers around for a long time instead of relying on a bunch of cheap labor.”

Jia’s eyebrows lifted. “That’s not how empires are built, Zhang Yixing.”

“Yeah,” he shrugged. “But maybe it’s how they’re sustained.”

Jia smiled to herself as he went back to work. She kept quiet for a few minutes, watching him, and strangely she didn’t feel awkward. “You know,” she spoke up, “You’re really the weird kid in your group of friends.”

“How so?” he asked, looking at her with a little grin on his face. Jia shrugged.

“They’re pretty high strung,” she said. “Kind of scary. Half the time I don’t even understand what Feifei is thinking.” She didn’t mention Kris, even though she had nothing to hide about her relationship. But it still seemed indiscreet, somehow.

He didn’t say anything. But Jia could tell he was thinking it over by the way he chewed at his cheek and focused on the dirt, so she didn’t interrupt.

“I think,” he said, looking up at her, “It’s just how we were raised. I mean, our parents had nothing until the 1980s and then they built these empires from scratch, right? And then we’re born, and we grow up wealthy, but our parents also taught us how to be mean, because they remember what it was like, before China changed.”

Jia considered that. Most adults she knew didn’t talk about China’s tumultuous 20th century. There were some elements of history that Jia hadn’t even been exposed to until she left the country, and then it was hard to discern where the truth lay between both American and Chinese propaganda. Her American friends of course insisted that there was no propaganda on the American side, but they didn’t really understand China. No one _really_ understood China, but there was something different about being raised on Chinese soil, breathing Chinese air, thinking in Chinese languages, having China in your blood.

“So you’re the one wise oddball of your friends who is above all this?” She was teasing, a little bit, but she also wanted to see what he’d say. The rich weren’t often reflective, and shied away from an accurate self-perception. She saw this tendency even in Feifei sometimes, although it didn’t bother her much.

But Yixing shook his head. “No. I mean, I can see it and call it for what it is,” he picked another rock out of the dirt, “But an alcoholic who acknowledges his problem is still an alcoholic. He just has a better chance of dealing with it.”

“And you’re addicted to wealth?” Jia asked, a little amused.

Yixing nodded very seriously. “The whole country is drunk on it. Or the idea of it. I’m just trying to stay sober.”

“You’ve got a lot of temptation in front of you,” Jia mused. She knew enough from both Feifei and Kris to surmise that the Zhang empire was vast. Yixing wouldn’t inherit as much as his cousin, Liyin, but the differences between them were only significant among the upper class. To Jia, they were all enormously wealthy.

“I think I can be better.” He was still too serious for the moment. “I have to try.”

Maybe Jia had misjudged him initially. What she’d taken for prudish disapproval might really stem from his being a misfit in his world.

“You know, Zhang Yixing,” she said, “I think we should be friends.”

He blinked. “Why?” He sounded very genuine, and Jia laughed out loud.

“Because I think you might be the only sane one. I need someone that I can roll my eyes at when Zitao starts complaining about the price of getting his car reupholstered.”

“Is he getting it redone _again_?” Yixing sighed. “He needs to learn to invest instead of impulse buy.”

“He gets anxious and tries to medicate it with shopping,” Jia explained. She brushed her bangs out of her eyes and found herself smiling again. “Hey. Friends?”

He looked at her with a smile that seemed a little bemused. “Yeah. Okay. See you around.”

 

* * *

 

Lu Han’s father was almost unanimously liked—a tricky feat to accomplish in the shrouded circles of PRC politics. But Lu Han grew up seeing his father as the epitome of popularity, the standard Lu Han could never reach himself. His father had a knack for making other people feel wise and important. He could suggest an idea and make the other people in the room think it was theirs. He’d cultivated an image of himself such that even when Lu Han was in grade school, his teachers would offer him special perks and he was rarely scolded. Sometimes Lu Han acted out just to see what would happen. But no reprimand ever came, and he felt so guilty afterward that he never became a full-time rebel.

Receiving a phone call from his father was another matter altogether. Lu Han’s father preferred to convey messages through Lu Han’s mother. When he actually went out of his way to call Lu Han himself, it was because Lu Han had either done something horribly wrong (like when he skipped a dinner with visiting Chinese officials during his sophomore year) or because he needed Lu Han to do something. The latter was almost always boring.

“Down in the basement,” his father said briskly, his voice crackling over the phone, “I stored a couple of cardboard boxes of old files. Burn those, okay? They’re outdated and might as well be thrown out, but we need to protect people’s privacy.” Then he hung up.

So Lu Han went down into the basement of their Los Angeles mansion. It was a finished basement with a home movie theater, but there was storage space as well. Most of the storage space was used for furniture his mother bought but then was saving for some hypothetical redecoration project. Lu Han found the boxes his father was talking about, buried behind some paintings that probably belonged in a museum instead of his parents’ “private collection” aka their basement. He hauled the boxes upstairs to one of the spacious living rooms with a fireplace.

But some inexplicable intuition made Lu Han open up the boxes to see what was inside. They were full of old files, dated to the late 1980s and early 1990s. Lu Han flipped through one to see what it said.

The longer he read, the more he felt fear prickling over his skin.

If he wasn’t currently in law school, and hadn’t been raised in the convoluted world of Chinese politics, he might not have recognized the files for what they were. But he did. He could read between the lines. These were paper records of the first bribes his father ever took.

Lu Han went through all the boxes, scattering their contents on the plush carpet his mother had bought from some exclusive boutique. Almost every family was here. The Wangs, the Songs, the Huangs, the Zhous, the Lis, even the Laus, who had long since left their Chinese enterprises behind. There were countless other families as well. They had funded the house Lu Han was sitting in. The only family Lu Han couldn’t find in the files was the Zhangs, but that didn’t mean they were clean. He doubted anyone was.

Law in China could be a vague and flexible concept, but what Lu Han had in front of him wouldn’t be easy for his father to spin if it ever went public. This wasn’t bending the law. This was subverting the very idea of law for a different, more pragmatic one—the law of the highest bidder. This meant that all of the families could have hundreds, if not thousands, of violations to their companies’ names, from human rights to more complicated economic ones. All of those wiped away by his father. And now his father wanted him to wipe away all the evidence.

Lu Han could only guess that his father had kept records as leverage against the families, a means of keeping them under his control should they get tired of pandering to him. Now, for whatever reason, the old records were no longer necessary. They’d been languishing in a Los Angeles basement and now they should be turned to ash. And the foolish Lu son was supposed to do it.

He felt like he was a child again, waiting around for the punishments that never came even when he’d deliberately done something wrong. When he was seven he punched another kid during recess and nothing happened. When he was nine he lied and said a teacher kissed him and the teacher was fired and nothing happened. When he was eleven he vandalized the school computer lab and nothing happened. When he was twelve he skipped every day of school for three months and smoked cigarettes with some migrant workers’ children in the poor sections of the city and he passed the year and nothing happened. When he was thirteen he was shipped off to America for high school and he stopped trying to break rules because he wanted to be liked. He changed into the perfect politician’s son, and now he was the politician’s son who would burn evidence of corruption. And nothing would happen.

His heart beating very hard, Lu Han took every file and put them back inside the cardboard boxes. And then he sat back on his heels and stared at them, holding his head in his hands.

 

* * *

 

Jia’s internship was much better than she’d expected it to be. Most of her colleagues were young and outgoing, and while some of them were a good few years older, they never put too much pressure on the interns. She had two fellow newbies with her, Amanda and Christina, who were both from UCLA and with a penchant for Starbucks and frequent coffee breaks. They worked on the same project together, and while Jia didn’t manage to go out of the office as often as she would have liked, it was turning out to be good anyway.

Besides, staying in the office meant that she and Kris were able to meet up discretely whenever they had the chance to. He was in another wing of the building and that made it insanely difficult to see each other all the time, but Jia always hoped that out of the millions of calls she got a day, one of them would be from Kris. Sometimes he delivered, most of the other times he couldn’t. When he didn’t turn up during coffee breaks Jia mostly spent them alone on the rooftop garden, or stayed at her desk doing work until everyone came back.

But she was learning. The Wangs had a wide enough grip on the Los Angeles area, and Jia knew it was because of the sheer number of Chinese who trusted the brand name back in the motherland. Mostly Jia worked on press releases about their new online shopping mall, but also planned for the party that was going to officially launch it. She’d sent about over a hundred invites already, to the press and to the huge socialite circle that was active in L.A.. Feifei’s she personally hand-delivered to her office.

“Why did they print this out for me?” Feifei frowned at the gold gilded card, mystified. Jia couldn’t help but laugh at her reaction. “I mean, seriously. Couldn’t they just have given me a call?”

“It’s the personal touch people like.” Jia shrugged and sat down in the chair opposite Feifei, taking the opportunity to kill her heels off. “We also delivered one to your father. Just to let you know.”

Feifei rolled her eyes. “I bet he was pleased.” She scoffed and stood up to walk over to her tea table. Jia watched as Feifei made a cup of tea with all the finesse of a master. She looked like she did this all the time, which she probably did. Feifei most likely had lessons with a tea grandmaster just so she could make top grade tea whenever she wanted. It was just something Feifei did because she could, and while Jia wasn’t able to understand it, she didn’t feel like it was her place to judge either.

“I hope so.” Jia said and looked out of the window. Feifei’s office faced outwards and had a fantastic view of downtown, but she could also see the other wing just peeking out of a corner. She wondered what Kris was doing right now. “Having to liaise all these invites has been a complete pain in the butt.”

“And the party will be a success because of you.” Feifei said approvingly and Jia smiled. Hopefully it’d work out that way, but she was just an intern. Most of the credit wouldn’t go to her. Nonetheless this would look very good on her resume. “Parties here don’t usually fail anyway.”

Jia could hear the derision in her voice. Feifei wasn’t wrong: she’d sent out invites to Zitao, Sehun, and almost all of their friends who mixed in the same circles as they did. These people had nothing else but money, Jia thought, and parties to them were easy to get some fun out of. She pondered on whether any of them would truly be interested in the online shopping mall, but they probably wouldn’t be. Feifei had a personal shopper, something that Jia was sure she’d never be able to figure out how to use.

“The thought of having to entertain all these people makes my head hurt.” Feifei sighed and sipped at her tea. The launch of the online shopping mall was a big thing, a collaboration between the Wangs and various Korean companies. Jia knew that some of Sehun and Zitao’s friends, like Byun Baekhyun and Park Chanyeol, were also involved. “Why did they have to hold this in L.A.?”

“Well you won’t be alone.” Jia reached over for a candy in Feifei’s tin of treats that she kept on her desk. “Kris is going to be there too.”

Feifei’s expression darkened and Jia immediately realised that she might have said something wrong. But Feifei didn’t flare up and simply set her tea mug down. Jia swallowed and waited for a scolding. It didn’t come, however, and Feifei started typing on her computer again.

“Sorry.” Jia said and Feifei shrugged. “I mean, he’s also working in the company, and I guess… he could help out? I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

Feifei held up a hand and stopped typing. “Don’t be. You apologising for him means he’s won you over already.” Her tone was slightly unkind but Jia could sense that she wasn’t angry. Or at least as angry as she used to be whenever talking about Kris. The thing was, Kris wanted to get closer to Feifei. Jia didn’t get why Feifei would not simply listen for a change, but she knew that pride factored a great deal in her character. Kris’s sincerity in the matter made Jia determined to help their relationship out, however, so she tried to persevere a little more.

“Feifei, he just wants to help out.” Jia started and Feifei snorted. “You guys are siblings. Don’t be like this.”

Feifei looked at her for a long moment, and Jia swore she could see something that wasn’t the severe dislike she usually had for Kris. Then it was gone, and Feifei exhaled loudly. Jia watched her with wide eyes, and then she finally nodded curtly.

“As long as he stays out of my way.”

Jia smiled and stretched over the desk to give Feifei a nice, tight hug.

 

* * *

 

Lu Han stubbed out the cigarette. He didn’t usually smoke this much and when he did it was only cigars, but this was the best he could get from a gas station on the way back home. He picked at the rubber lining of the glass door that opened up to his balcony. It didn’t come apart. Stayed strong like the foundations of his family fortune. Lu Han laughed and fumbled for the box.

“God, it smells like shit in here.” The door cracked open and Yixing slid his head in. Lu Han ignored him and patted his pocket for his lighter. “What the hell is up with you?”

Yixing stepped inside and frowned. He waved his hand in front of him, as if to clear the air, but Lu Han knew it was fruitless. Like too many of the things he’d found out today. He found the lighter and snapped it to life. Yixing was watching as he lit up a new stick and closed his lips around it. His housemate never did approve of smoking, but then again Yixing never socialised as much as he did with his father.

“Are you going to tell me what’s wrong,” Yixing sat down on his bed directly opposite and faced him with a stern expression, “or are you going to give yourself lung cancer?”

Lu Han kept quiet. Yixing tapped his foot, waiting for an answer. But Lu Han had none to give. He wasn’t prepared or willing to share the weight of all that he’d found out with Yixing, of all people. Yixing was the one person in Lu Han’s life that wasn’t like the rest. He would do the right thing, and Lu Han wasn’t sure if he could himself.

“Just wanted some nicotine.” Lu Han shrugged and Yixing frowned incredulously at him. “Don’t be so fucking whiney.”

Yixing looked like he wanted to snap right back at him, but didn’t. Instead he got up to push the balcony doors open. A rush of cold air swept over Lu Han’s face, and suddenly the smell of cigarette stank was all the more obvious. All he had to do was open that door. Lu Han had done it today, and the waking up was more painful that he’d ever thought. In fact he had never thought of it before. His family had made sure of that.

“Sure.” Yixing finally said and Lu Han could see him tap his feet again impatiently on the floor. “Do whatever you like. Just don’t poison Mew Mew, because you know, she is your cat.”

And who was going to look out for him? Lu Han’s head pounded and he sucked in on the cigarette. It burned red and he resisted the urge to throw it aside and vomit in the bathroom. Instead he just watched Yixing’s feet as he walked back to the door and pulled it shut as quietly as he could. Fuck, Lu Han thought, fuck the world and everything he had believed in. If his faith had cracked when he came back from Beijing, now it was shattered. He sucked on the cigarette again, and this time when the ashes landed on his knee, smouldering white and grey, it didn’t hurt at all.

 

* * *

 

Feifei’s heels echoed as she walked through the parking garage of the company building, her eyes on her phone. She kept getting calls from different people needing her approval on how to handle last-minute problems with the launch party set-up, which was putting her in a bad mood. The launch party itself made her uneasy. She just wanted to go home, squeeze into her skin-tight dress, and get the evening over with.

“Don’t you look gorgeous?”

Feifei jumped and looked up. Zhou Mi was leaning against her car, his broad grin turned up a few watts to maximum brightness.

“Do you have to be so creepy?” she scoffed, walking up to him and kissing him on the cheek. “What are you even doing here?”

“A guy can’t support his girlfriend when her company launches an extremely expensive business venture?” he asked. She straightened out his leather jacket and gave him an irritated look.

“You don’t need to worry,” she said. Zhou Mi rolled his eyes and walked around to get into her car, while Feifei climbed in and cranked the engine.

“Of course I need to worry,” he said as he folded himself into the passenger seat. “Last time I checked, you were going to play rebel leader and bring China’s economy crashing down around you.”

Feifei didn’t respond and pulled out of the parking garage and into the bright late afternoon sunlight. The fact that Zhou Mi had flown all the way here wasn’t unusual, but his still being worried about her was. She almost wanted to lie to him. But she couldn’t. She needed him. In spite of everything, she had a strong feeling that they’d end up together in the end, whether they got married or not. And given what she was planning, he needed to be ready with the lifeboat, because she was going to sink their corrupted ship of exorbitant wealth as soon as she could.

“Anyway,” Feifei said, knowing that he noticed her ignoring his comment, “How long are you going to be here?”

She glanced over and saw that Zhou Mi was frowning. “How long do you need me here?” he asked.

“I’m not sure. A little while longer, at least.”

“You’re really going to turn on your own father?”

She didn’t look over this time. It wasn’t an easy pill to swallow, him reminding her just how unfilial she was being. She’d thought it over a hundred times already. She thought about it when she was combing through the Wang Corporation’s old records for evidence. She thought about it when she was digging up old newspaper articles to look for leads. In the end, she kept making the same decision.

“It’s what my mother would have done,” she said. “You know that.”

Zhou Mi fell silent and Feifei tried to imagine her mother in this situation. Her mother was strong and steely. She spent a lot of time teaching Feifei how to survive. More than that, she taught her how to recognize right and wrong. Feifei wondered if she knew what kind of corruption the Wang Corporation was steeped in. If that was why she was always so careful in her warnings to Feifei.

“Do you have a contingency plan?” Zhou Mi asked. “If this all blows up, you might be left with nothing, and you could seriously affect China itself.”

“I have the trust fund my mother willed to me,” Feifei said. “And my maternal grandparents would support me. But, Zhou Mi.” She looked at him now to make sure she realized how serious she was. “ _You_ are my contingency plan. You can see this coming, and you can start investing where it counts.”

“And what else?” he asked. “What about the country.”

“For that,” Feifei said, “I’m going to have to talk to the Zhangs.”


	6. 寔命不同

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Wang Corporation launches their online shopping mall venture in conjunction with Korean investors. Los Angeles's resident Chinese and Korean socialites turn up for the launch party, all with their own secrets to hide.

 

寔命不同  
_Our lot is not like theirs_

 

* * *

 

  
**Search: #syopinonline**

 

  
_#syopinonline One third through venue set up! If you're looking forward to the party tonight, remember to track #syopinonline as we give you updates on the glitziest party in LA_

 

  
_#fashionwatch our very own intern Meng Jia gets ready for #syopinonline launch_

 

  
_#spotted Korean chaebol heartthrob Oh Sehun arrives at #syopinonline launch party. (Wonder who he's dating these days?)_

 

* * *

 

“You look beautiful.”

The way Minseok said it was almost begrudging, and Sohee just smoothed out her skirt and glanced at herself in the hallway mirror. She'd straightened her hair, worn the dangling earrings someone had asked her to wear, and she did look nice. But she felt about as apathetic as her brother sounded.

“Let’s go charm people,” she said, rolling her eyes. Minseok reached for his keys and they walked out to his Mercedes. In her heels, she was the same height as him, and people were more likely to take them as twins. Even if they were twins, her brother would still be favored. As always.

The launch party of the Wangs’ online shopping mall would be a grand event in any situation, but the Ahns had to be present because the Ahn family had invested in the massive collaboration between the Wangs and the Korean companies owned by the Byuns, the Parks, and more. Sohee had to learn the details through Minseok, which frustrated her. Huge dealings like this made her uneasy. There were so many ways for it to fall apart, and she didn’t think anyone was as meticulous as she herself would be. She didn’t really trust anyone but herself.

They arrived at the event, which was being covered by both the Chinese and Korean media. Sohee thought it was amusing as she and Minseok paused to have their photographs taken. Here in Los Angeles they could be anonymous. When Sohee went to the gym or to a ballet class, no one treated her as anything except another Korean immigrant among thousands. And yet on the opposite side of the globe, her mere appearance at an event was an endorsement.

They handed in their invitations at the door and Minseok put his hand on her back. “Don’t piss anyone off, okay?” he said into her ear. “Let’s not repeat that disaster at the Jungs’ gala last year.”

“Kwon Jiyong touched my ass,” she hissed back. “Your job, as oppa, is to punch him in the face. You didn’t, so I took it upon myself.”

“Yeah, everyone saw your fabulous taekwondo training at work. Kwon Jiyong also _sued us_ , and won. And if you had waited, like, thirty seconds I might have punched him for you. I was on the other side of the room.”

“Whatever.” Sohee shrugged him off and headed for one of the staff handing out champagne. She really hated playing the part of socialite. If it were up to her, she’d just stay home. Minseok was the same way, really, even with his massive parties that he threw. Sohee knew. He really preferred just staying in, too.

She sipped on her champagne and surveyed the room. Wang Feifei was at the far end, greeting people with a sparkling, practiced smile. Her boyfriend was with her. Sohee had heard a bit about them from her brother’s friend, Lu Han. It was clear that, at least tonight, Zhou Mi was happy to play accessory to his girlfriend. Wang Feifei looked halfway to being CEO. Sohee was jealous.

The Jungs were behind her, Jessica and Krystal, looking pretty and annoying while they chatted with some of the entertainment-types Sohee couldn’t bother to keep up with. It looked like a Kpop boy band was here tonight, which was silly.

Her brother had found Lu Han, Zhang Yixing, and Zhang Liyin, and was already laughing like they were at home instead of out making displays of their wealth. Sohee kept track of the Zhangs, though. They held a substantial amount of power in Asia, and she admired Zhang Liyin. She admired any woman who got what Sohee so badly wanted: executive power.

A short distance from them, the Oh brothers were standing with Park Chanyeol, Huang Zitao, and another guy Sohee didn’t recognize, who loomed even taller than Chanyeol. She pondered this for a moment, and then surmised that this was Kris Wu, the stepson of Mr. Wang, described by Minseok as “clawing his way into the top ranks.” Minseok thought he’d succeed, too. Sohee made a mental note of where they were standing and resolved to keep herself as far away from Chanyeol as she could.

At that moment, Chanyeol looked up and made eye contact with her. Sohee looked away quickly, hoping that her irritation was visible across the room. He started heading toward her anyway. Rather than endure his over-eager flirting, Sohee swiftly strode toward her brother’s circle and wedged her way inside, looping her arm through Minseok’s and plastering a smile on her face.

“Park Chanyeol,” she said with gritted teeth. Minseok nodded and gave Lu Han a look, and for whatever reason, Lu Han immediately closed ranks on their circle. Sometimes Sohee underestimated her brother. Most of the time she estimated him very accurately, but still.

“It’s pretty impressive, anyway,” Yixing said, apparently picking up where he left off. “The Wangs could make millions off of this, you realize.”

“They’ve expanded so much in the last few years, it’s almost incomprehensible,” Liyin said. “I don’t think they needed the Korean collaboration, honestly, it’s just that Korean products are so popular right now.”

“From what I heard, they definitely had the upper hand in negotiations,” Minseok said. Sohee looked over at her brother, surprised. She didn’t realize he paid attention to these things. “I know the Byuns felt like they got the short end of the deal. Same reason the Jungs only are offering a limited collection right now. Testing the waters first.”

“Well, the Wangs dominate the shipping market in China,” Liyin said. “I doubt they’ll have much trouble transitioning into this market, too. They’ve been really savvy about it. Moved incredibly fast.”

“Too fast, almost,” Yixing said. “I know it’s a different business, but they skipped a lot of red tape. Unless they have a small army of people who just dealt with all the legal bullshit, which is possible.”

“Not probable, though,” Liyin said cooly.

Something very strange happened then. Sohee could actually feel Lu Han receding, drawing inward on himself without actually moving away. She looked over and saw that he looked very pale, and he was staring resolutely at the floor. Both of the Zhangs were looking at him, but with notably different expressions—Liyin was impassive, and Yixing looked troubled. She looked over at her brother, who shook his head sharply.

“I need a drink,” Lu Han muttered. He then darted toward the bar.

“What just happened?” Sohee asked, mostly to her brother. Again, Minseok shook his head sharply, and by the time Sohee might have questioned the Zhangs, Liyin had started talking to the Jungs, and Yixing had drifted away to talk to one of the event coordinators, who looked like she might be an intern. And Park Chanyeol had spotted the dissolution of their circle and was headed her way.

“You’re going to tell me what is going on,” Sohee told her brother.

“Not now,” Minseok muttered. “I can’t tell you now.”

“Fine.” Sohee turned on her heel and made a beeline for Bae Suzy, who had just walked in on the arm of a Korean actor. She could almost be certain that the actor would start chatting up Chanyeol in hopes of a CF deal, take up all Chanyeol’s time, and eventually, Sohee could circle back around to her brother. If not him, she would go for Lu Han, and find out that way what the hell was going on.

 

* * *

 

  
  
_#spotted Heir to Ahn banking empire Ahn Minseok arrives at #syopinonline with his sister for his date #aw_

 

  
_Korea's favorite socialite Ahn Sohee #spotted at the launch of #syopinonline_

 

  
_#spotted Olympics hopeful Huang Zitao and the handsome Choi Junmyeon are excited for #syopinonline_

 

* * *

 

Feifei dodged two servers on her way to hide in the bathroom. There were too many people milling around, and everytime she tried to crane for a look of the room, somebody would approach her. Mostly they were reporters looking for a soundbite, and she would give it to them, but she’d already done the same thing for over forty-five minutes. What Feifei really wanted to do was to find Zhang Liyin. She had it on record that Liyin was here (her invitation had been received at the door), and all she had to do now was actually manage to find her in person.

As she walked towards the exit, she spotted a familiar looking dress from the new Dolce & Gabbana collection that had come out two weeks ago. It was Liyin, talking avidly to Jessica Jung of the Jung cosmetics family in a corner of the ballroom. Feifei took a quick, deep breath and walked as fast as she could to where they were without tripping over her seven inch heels. Liyin looked up when she was halfway there, and gave her a polite nod. Her family and the Zhangs weren’t as well acquainted as her father wanted them to be. The Zhangs made government money, while they tried to. In China, everyone wanted to be associated with politics, if only for the great range of benefits being chummy with politicians provided. Her father had been trying for the past decade, but nobody did it as well as the Zhangs.

“Hello.” Feifei greeted as she reached the both of them. Jessica seemed a little surprised but exchanged a friendly hug with her. Liyin did the same, but was a little more withdrawn than Jessica was. Feifei wasn’t surprised; the girl must have been raised as a princess. The main family branch of the Zhangs had only one heiress, Liyin, and it didn’t look like they were going to pass the business down to anyone else, not even Yixing, who was the second grandson but never seemed to get the same sort of treatment. “How do you girls like the party?”

Jessica laughed and shook her flute of pink champagne. “Very classy. I love the caviar, where is it from?” Feifei rattled off the details she’d memorised over the course of an afternoon, as Liyin watched politely and sipped at her own glass. There had to be a way that she could get to talk to Liyin privately without flipping Jessica off. The Jungs were as big in scale as the Byuns in Korea, and her father had been adamant about treating both companies as equally as they could. Rich, coming from him.

Luckily for her, Jessica’s sister did the job before she could. Jessica nodded apologetically before she strode over to where Krystal was, laughing with Kim Jongin and some very made-up boys that Feifei sort of recognised as the new Korean-Chinese boy band that they had invited to perform tonight. She and Liyin watched as Jessica was introduced, and Feifei wanted to laugh at the starstruck expression one of the idol boys had as he shook Jessica’s hand.

“They have a lot of people in that group.” Feifei began as casually as she could, and raised her glass to drink slowly.

“Twelve,” Liyin actually replied, “six members each in two units.”

Feifei blinked. “I didn’t know you were into boy bands.”

Liyin’s effortless expression didn’t change as she finished the rest of her champagne and shrugged. “They’re under Jongdae’s company.”

She’d almost forgotten about Liyin dating the eldest son of Korea’s biggest entertainment company. The public didn’t know because the Zhangs had clamped down tightly on the news, but everyone who mingled in the same social circles knew about them. Liyin was three years older and Kim Jongdae was crazy about her. It was the closest to a Cinderella story that their people could get, even though Jongdae’s family had one of the highest net worths in Korea for the last decade running. Sometimes one just could not compete with Chinese government money.

“So, is he here?” Feifei sounded so chirpy she wanted to shut herself up. “Didn’t see him yet!”

Liyin gave her an odd look, before shaking her head. “He’s in Seoul. That boy band,” she gestured and Feifei caught one of them smiling an entirely perfect smile, “is going to start a promotion cycle in China soon. Jongin’s attending in his place tonight.”

Good, Feifei thought, one less distraction. She tried to think of a way to phrase it nicely so that Liyin wouldn’t think of her as crazy, but gave up almost immediately. There was no good way to say that you needed someone’s help in bringing down your father for corruption. And everyone else’s along the way as well. Liyin was looking at her with a slightly odd expression again, so Feifei took a deep breath and threw all pretenses to the wind.

“I need to talk to you.” She said and Liyin’s brow furrowed slightly. That was the most expression she’d shown in the entire conversation. “It’s very important. Please, let’s go somewhere private.”

Liyin didn’t resist. Feifei led the way out of the ballroom and into one of the smaller rooms that they used as a temporary storeroom for the event props. The music pulsated through the room as Feifei shut the door. Even here Liyin looked completely unfazed, serene in her new D&G dress. She had seated herself before Feifei turned around. Now that they were really alone, Feifei found herself at a loss for words. Again, there wasn’t an easy way to put “I want to expose my father for corruption” across to someone that she’d met almost exclusively at social events and parties.

“I—” She opened her mouth and Liyin waited for her to continue, before giving her an almost-encouraging look. Feifei tried again. “I need your help. Please. I need to know who has also been bribing Procurator-General Lu.”

Now she looked stunned. Liyin was silent for a very long time, and Feifei could feel it hanging stagnant in the air. It wasn’t the most tactful way of saying it, but there was no space for regret. Besides, she didn’t. It was the truth, no matter how sordid it sounded, and she was all for the truth. Why else would she be here, Feifei thought darkly and almost wanted to laugh, trying to get someone to assist her in throwing her father behind bars?

“ _Also_?” Liyin finally said and Feifei could see the spark of a cold, smouldering emotion in her eyes. “What do you know?”

Feifei held her gaze and steeled herself.

“Not enough.”

 

* * *

 

  
  
_#spotted Managing Director Zhang Liyin looks serious at the launch of #syopinonline_

 

  
_#spotted Kim Jongin, the youngest son from Korea's biggest entertainment company SM Entertainment, arrives at the launch party with a cuppa Starbucks! We hear he's here today with the company's new boy band... #nextbigthing_

 

  
_Olympics hopeful Huang Zitao is handsome and happy at the launch of #syopinonline_

 

* * *

 

Zitao’s head started pounding as soon as he arrived at the party, and he couldn’t even have a drink, because he needed to be at the pool around 6 AM the next morning and Coach Li was slowly turning him into a teetotaler, or trying anyway. Sehun had elected himself as Zitao’s substitute and was drinking enough for the two of them, but luckily Sehun was fun when he was drunk. Kris, too, was more relaxed than usual, and he kept dragging Zitao around to introduce him to different investors, which made Zitao’s headache worse. He kept his smile in place, though, and shook hands with every person Kris introduced him to.

“I can’t keep track of all these people,” Zitao groaned. He eyed the glass of alcohol in Kris’s hand enviously.

“It doesn’t matter,” Kris said. “I know them all. You just have to win your competitions.”

Zitao watched as he polished off the glass and bit back his urge to snap at Kris. Winning was what he was _trying_ to do. Hence why he was skipping the alcohol, and using Kris’s funding to start a better regimen of steroids. Coach Li had actually shown some emotion when the money came in, saying, “ _Now_ we can make you a champion.” All Zitao knew anymore was that it had better fucking pay off.

Zhou Mi walked up to them then, his hands in the pockets of his Yves Saint Laurent suit and usual smile absent. “Have you guys seen Feifei?” he asked them.

“Not in a while,” Kris said. “She should really be here.”

Zitao had the odd impression that Kris and Zhou Mi were staring each other down. It had been a while since Zitao last saw Zhou Mi, but he didn’t remember him as being particularly combative.

“She _is_ here,” Zhou Mi said with a very false smile. “She’s just not here at this moment. And so, I’m looking for her.”

Kris shrugged. “It’s not my job to keep track of her at all times.”

Zhou Mi looked like he wanted to say something else, but he didn’t. Instead he turned to Zitao, replacing his smile. “Good to see you, Zitao. You look,” he frowned a little and poked at Zitao’s shoulder, “different.”

Sehun appeared out of nowhere, then, resting his chin on Zitao’s shoulder. “He looks like a fucking beast,” Sehun slurred, his hand landing heavily on Zitao’s other shoulder. “I’m so proud.”

“Get off of me.” Zitao spun out of Sehun’s grasp and Sehun teetered, trying to regain his balance. Normally Zitao would have just laughed, but he wasn’t in the mood. If he could just go home and sleep or just have a drink it would be different, but neither was an option.

“It’s getting to be that part of the night, then,” Zhou Mi said, not really to anyone in particular. He looked at Zitao, concern etched on his face, and Zitao bristled, waiting for some kind of reprimand. Instead, Zhou Mi gestured toward someone a little ways away. “Who’s that? He looks like he could be Choi Siwon’s kid brother.”

Zitao looked over. “That’s because he is Choi Siwon’s kid brother‚ Choi Junmyeon.”

Zhou Mi didn’t say anything and Zitao wasn’t in the mood to tease, play games, talk in innuendos, or do anything except go home.

“I’ve only heard of him dating girls and he’s kind of boring, like his brother but a lot less weird, and that’s literally all I can tell you but if you’re going to find out then you should go do that because you’re not going to learn any more standing here.” Zitao spoke all in one breath and Zhou Mi gave him a very odd look.

“I was just wondering who it was, Zitao. Don’t jump to conclusions.” He put his hand on Zitao’s shoulder like an older brother and it took all of Zitao’s will power not to shake his hand off. “Maybe you should go outside and get some air.”

“I’m fine,” Zitao snapped. Zhou Mi didn’t say anything else. Zitao ignored him until he walked away. When he was finally gone, Kris cleared his throat.

“Well, now that he’s distracted, I’m going to go find my stepsister.” Then he disappeared into the crowd, too, leaving Zitao standing in the corner with no alcohol and no friends and a very strong desire to punch something.

But then Jia appeared, her arm around Sehun’s waist as he stumbled around. “Hey,” she said to Zitao, “Zhou Mi said you needed me. What’s up?”

“Nothing. I’m fine.” Zitao knew he sounded rude, but he couldn’t seem to control his words. Jia’s brow furrowed.

“Well—help me get Sehun outside before he vomits on someone, at least.”

They dragged Sehun out the door of the ballroom, through some hallways, and outside into one of the empty gardens surrounding the building. Jia tried to direct him toward a bench, but somehow Sehun ended up sitting on the sidewalk in his expensive Calvin Klein outfit, grinning up at them.

“You guys look so—” Sehun searched for the right word. “Sexy. Like, wow. Ten out of ten. Would do both of you.”

Jia and Zitao looked at each other. Sehun hadn’t gotten this drunk in a while, not at a fancy party at least, and Zitao would probably have to babysit him for the rest of the evening unless he wanted Sehun to single-handedly offend half the partygoers. Maybe they should just leave, actually. That sounded like a good excuse to Zitao.

“Don’t fool around with your friends, Sehun,” Jia told him, sounding very much like a teacher. Zitao sighed. Jia always tried to reason with Sehun when he was drunk, even though it was utterly useless.

“You know Jia,” Sehun said, “We never see you anymore. Every time we call, you’re too busy fucking Kris. Zitao here is so sad. He misses you all the time.”

Jia looked at him again and Zitao stared resolutely at the sidewalk. So he may have made a comment to Sehun along the lines of “I miss my best friend” but that wasn’t something Sehun was supposed to _repeat_ and actually he should have forgotten it by now. Zitao felt very vulnerable, his soft underbelly of sentimentality suddenly exposed.

“You didn’t say anything to me,” Jia said softly.

“Sehun’s drunk,” Zitao snapped. “You can do what you want. I don’t care if you’re busy fucking your way into a job.”

A long silence. Zitao shivered. He’d screwed up bad with that comment, and he knew it, but he didn’t want to take it back. Wasn’t going to. Jia wasn’t around anymore, she wasn’t visiting him, and he didn’t care what she did at all.

“Say that again,” Jia said. Anger tremored low and dark in her voice. “Say that again and this time you look me in the eyes while you say it.”

So Zitao looked at her. Her eyes were shiny, like she could cry, and she was shaking a little. It registered dimly in Zitao’s mind that he could take everything back now.

Instead he looked her in the eyes and said, “If you want to fuck the whole Wang family to get yourself a job, I do not care.”

Jia reeled around and slapped him across the face. Then she stalked off, leaving Zitao and Sehun alone in the garden. Zitao’s cheek stung and he started laughing because he was so unhappy and it felt like the whole world was unbalanced under his feet and he didn’t know how to set anything right again.

“Did you want that to happen?” Sehun asked. Zitao glared at him and opened his mouth to say something, but then Sehun turned around to the grass and hurled.

 

* * *

 

  
  
_#socialitewatch Will we ever hear wedding bells for long-time couple Zhou Mi and Wang Feifei, newly appointed director of #syopinonline?_

 

  
_Choi Junmyeon and Do Kyungsoo try out the instant photo machine at the #syopinonline launch_

 

  
_#spotted Zhang Yixing avoids the cameras at the #syopinonline launch_

 

* * *

 

Yixing stepped away from the party and out onto one of the patios, taking a deep breath of cool air and checking the time on his watch. Midnight. He half expected them all to show their true colors now, like some warped version of Cinderella, but of course the masks never fell away and the charade carried on.

Nothing felt right recently, and the launch party only made that feeling intensify. Something was noticeably wrong with Lu Han, and he was self-medicating with alcohol and cigarettes. If Yixing had to choose, he’d take the cigarettes—less chance of disastrous car wrecks or destroying the house in a drunken rage. He couldn’t monitor Lu Han all the time, though, and until Lu Han was willing to talk to him, he’d just have to wait. But Liyin’s warning kept rattling around in his head. Yixing was starting to wonder if his cousin knew even more than she was willing to share.

And the way his cousin had talked about this launch party unsettled him too. Everything looked so perfect from the outside. Business partners matched by fate. Guaranteed profits. Everyone was smiling. Wang Feifei looked like a queen arriving at her coronation ceremony. Even if she hadn’t been the one to orchestrate the deal, it was her empire to inherit. Kris Wu would either have to dramatically prove himself, or Feifei fall dramatically from grace, for anything to change. It all felt very fated, very mechanical. There was something lurking under the surface of the water here, though, something Yixing could sense but not see.

His thoughts were interrupted by the heavy click of heels coming down the cobblestone path. After a moment, the heels-wearer rounded the corner and Yixing was pleasantly surprised to see Meng Jia walking toward him. She looked really nice, he thought. She always looked nice but she looked nice dressed up, too. Not that she didn’t look just as nice in jeans and a t-shirt but he also liked the way she looked in a dress.

His thoughts were so tangled up that it took him a moment to realize she was upset. She didn’t even notice him standing there until she’d stepped into the patio area and started dabbing at her eyes with a tissue, working at an odd angle to avoid her eye makeup.

“Oh!” she said when she noticed him. “Sorry. I’m just—just heading back inside.”

“What’s wrong?” he asked. She blinked and he mentally kicked himself for not learning the art of subtlety that his mother was always trying to drill in his head, but somehow he always ended up just saying what exactly what he meant instead of hiding it behind carefully crafted words. He tried to craft his words to be as accurate to his meaning as possible, but he still lacked the ability to say three different things at once and leave the meaning up to the listener.

She laughed lightly. “Zitao’s an asshole, that’s all.”

Yixing stuffed his hands into his pockets and considered this. “He seems really off lately,” Yixing mused. “Irritable. I actually haven’t seen much of him at all, which is weird. It’s Zitao. He loves parties.”

“Yeah, well,” Jia said, pressing the tips of her fingers on her forehead, right between her eyebrows, “He can’t drink. His swimming coach will suspend him for hangovers.” She laughed again and Yixing thought she was going to start crying, but she held the tears back.

“What did he say?” Yixing asked. Maybe he shouldn’t have asked, but it seemed like the right thing to do. She didn’t have to answer if she didn’t want to.

“Oh, you know,” Jia laughed, “Just said that I’m screwing Kris to get myself a job. No big deal.”

“He’s an asshole,” Yixing said seriously. It was out of character for Zitao to say something like that. It was also out of line. Totally out of line.

“I’m not, you know,” Jia said. She pursed her lips like she was still trying not to cry. “Feifei told me to apply for the internship before I even met Kris.”

Yixing’s heart sank. He wished he could tell her that of course no one thought such terrible things about her, but he’d heard Byun Baekhyun insinuate the same thing earlier that evening under the guise of “checking out the event coordinator.” And while Kris wasn’t exactly broadcasting their relationship, gossip spread fast and the vague comments Kris had made painted Jia as some kind of living sex fantasy. All of it made Yixing feel ill, mostly because he liked Jia. After all, they’d agreed to be friends.

“I never thought that,” he told her. It was the most he could say honestly. She looked up and he wanted to say more, but more than that he wanted to warn her away from all of them. It wouldn’t get better. She’d just be sucked into their world and even though he guessed Jia was strong, that didn’t mean much in their world. Being strong wasn’t good enough when you had to be victorious. You had to be _better_ than everyone else. Jia struck him as the type of girl who would play fair, which was about the same as losing.

“It’s a good party though, right?” She gestured to the ballroom behind the big glass doors and gave a half-hearted smile. Yixing thought about the intrigue swirling around inside and tried to imagine it from her perspective.

“Yeah,” he said kindly. “You did really good.”

“I’m just an intern,” she laughed. Then, more seriously, “Thanks, Yixing.”

He smiled. “Don’t let Zitao get to you, okay?” he said. “He’ll apologize. You know he doesn’t mean it.”

She looked skeptical, but she nodded. She turned to go back inside. “I’ll see you around, okay?”

Yixing waved goodbye and turned around to look back into the night. If Zitao didn’t apologize, Yixing would make him apologize. He might not be able to hurt Zitao physically, but he could be persuasive and Zitao had a conscience. Jia needed someone on her team, that was for sure.

 

* * *

 

  
  
_Kris Wu supports stepsister Wang Feifei at the launch of #syopinonline_

 

  
_#spotted Jung sisters Krystal and Jessica show support for #syopinonline_

 

  
_#socialitewatch Byun Baekhyun makes the presence of his family company known at the #syopinonline launch_

 

* * *

 

Zhou Mi had been urgently texting her for the past fifteen minutes, as Feifei stood in one of the corridors that led to the main ballroom and tried to wrap her head around things. Liyin had been relatively helpful but she knew that certain details were being kept out because Liyin also had no reason to trust her fully. Feifei closed her eyes hard and tried to steady her breathing. After she’d stood for five minutes with her hand against her forehead, Feifei decided that it was enough for now. There had to be more leads elsewhere.

As she made her way slowly back to where the buzz of the party was, she spotted someone that she’d met enough times over the course of the planning for the launch of the shopping mall. Byun Baekhyun was the second son of the Byun cosmetics family, and while she knew of his reputation as a hardcore partier, he was also quite the capable negotiator. The demand for a bigger cut of the cosmetics section for the Byuns had fallen through, but Feifei had managed to salvage the situation by making them promise to sell a limited collection at least. Baekhyun had been a difficult opponent, but now Feifei just watched as he made out with someone who was definitely not his long-time girlfriend Irene Bae.

It lasted for quite a while, but she leaned against the wall until they were done. Baekhyun didn’t shy away from her gaze, and cracked a smile at her instead. Feifei didn’t return it. The girl hung onto him for a while more, and when she turned around she recognised her to be one of the aspiring socialites that frequented most of the parties she had to appear at. Feifei couldn’t remember her name, but she bore a striking resemblance to Irene. Sick. Baekhyun didn’t even look at the girl as she entered the ballroom again, quite unwillingly as Feifei observed, and crossed his arms without breaking eye contact with her.

“You like a good peep show, huh.” Baekhyun nodded knowingly. Feifei resisted the urge to flip him off.

“There are eyes everywhere here.” Feifei crossed her arms slowly and raised an eyebrow. “Lots of people are friends with the Baes.” Irene’s family was in broadcasting, and owned three of Korea’s highest rated cable networks. If she wanted to, Baekhyun’s name would be dragged in the mud faster than before he’d even have time to react to it.

Baekhyun had the nerve to shrug. “We’re not together.” He paused and seemed to consider his answer. “At the moment. She can fuck whoever she wants right now. Not a problem to me.”

Feifei clamped down the instinct to heave. She didn’t know why she was having this conversation, but now Baekhyun was looking at her with such interest that she wanted to turn on her heel and walk away as quickly as she could. Zhou Mi knew Baekhyun through a few other mutual friends, and once told her that he could be “quite dark”. Feifei thought that it was a very mild description of the man in front of her who was tapping out a tune on the wall.

“I’d be more careful, nonetheless.” Feifei wasn’t about to let him win. At the very least she would need to get in a jab or two before leaving. “Someone might tattle to Irene. Then she wouldn’t let you fuck her again, would she?”

Baekhyun’s eyes narrowed, before he clapped slowly and laughed. Feifei tried her best but ended up rolling her eyes anyway. He was not the kind of person that she wanted to be involved with either at work or in her personal life. Baekhyun stopped laughing and eyed her again. This time it was more than interest; Feifei actually felt something cold rush down her back before he smiled at her one more time.

“I don’t mind if someone tells Irene anything. What I really mind, though,” he tilted his head to the side and blinked at her. “is someone trying to tell on me when it comes to business. You really should stop probing. Korea’s not your personal playground. If I don’t want you to find out what we’re doing, you won’t.”

Feifei was gripped momentarily by the fact that she’d been found out. Baekhyun nodded civilly, and continued. “I don’t want this venture to fail. Don’t make it fail, Feifei. That wouldn’t be nice. We’ve paid quite the amount for this.” He smiled again and Feifei wanted to punch him. How on earth could he be complicit and also this brazenly guiltless?

“Then you play nice too, Baekhyun.” She bristled but made sure her voice came out smooth. “Don’t allow me the chance to make it fail. Try me.”

Baekhyun looked at her, expressionless, before quirking the edges of his mouth very slightly upwards in a smile that made Feifei’s hair stand slightly. “Why not?”

The atmosphere was so charged that Feifei swore she wouldn’t lose by moving first. No way was she going to let Baekhyun gain the upper hand. So they remained in the same positions until the doors to the ballroom swung open. Feifei glanced at them out of the corner of her eye and recognised them as Do Kyungsoo and Park Minseul. Their families were in publishing and cars, and they had been engaged for longer than most of them were able to hold down a relationship. Baekhyun obviously did too, because he uncrossed his arms and let out a loud sigh. The couple froze and Feifei saw their eyes dart from her to Baekhyun, and then back again.

“Game’s over.” Baekhyun declared, and walked over to the doors. He clapped a hand on Kyungsoo’s shoulder before disappearing into the ballroom. Feifei glared at the oak doors. It wasn’t over, not by a long shot. She saw Minseul fidget, one hand firmly held by Kyungsoo, and immediately switched back to hostess mode.

“Are you looking for something?” She asked and Minseul exchanged a look with her fiance before shaking her head rapidly. “I can help.”

“We, uh, needed some air.” Kyungsoo replied and cleared his throat. It took a while before Feifei realised what they were referring to. She gave them a very polite smile, before retreating into the ballroom herself. Somewhere in the distance she could see Baekhyun’s blonde hair glint. The girl that looked like Irene had attached herself to him again. Feifei gripped her clutch and swore as she swiped a flute of champagne off a server’s tray. It didn’t matter if Baekhyun wanted to play games. She wasn’t going to lose. She never did.

As she stalked her way across to where she could see Zhou Mi was, Feifei became acutely aware of someone staring at her from the back. She whirled around, and her stomach sank. It was Kris, looking at her with something close to amusement. He was standing near the doors with his arms crossed and eyes knowing. He then pointed to where she and Baekhyun had been earlier, and she wondered what he thought he now knew. Feifei wanted to ignore him and let him flail. But she had already messed up enough with Baekhyun. Kris she still could threaten into submission, Feifei thought. So instead of heading towards Zhou Mi’s promise of refuge, she turned around and walked as steadily as she could towards Kris.

“Don’t fucking smile at me.” She gritted her teeth. Kris merely smiled wider.

 

* * *

 

  
  
_We are having a great time at the #syopinonline launch with Park Chanyeol, Oh Sehun, and Do Kyungsoo!_

 

  
_#socialitewatch Song Qian at the #syopinonline launch party without her fiancé. We wish her only the best for her marriage!_

 

  
_#socialitewatch The ever-handsome Lu Han makes an appearance at the #syopinonline launch party_

 

* * *

 

Lu Han wanted nothing more than to disappear.

The longer the launch party went on, the more he retreated into his fantasy. Cheap car, open road. Head into the vast Western states of the US and just drive for years. He had American citizenship he’d have to revoke if he ever wanted his father’s job. If he just disappeared he would never have to decide. The boxes of evidence were currently in the trunk of his car. While he drove he could throw them out into the road, where they’d fly into the yards of Americans who would look at the Chinese characters with puzzled faces and then throw away the records of Chinese government corruption without ever realizing what they held in their hands.

One of Lu Han’s greatest causes of shame was that he had a weak tolerance for alcohol. By one in the morning the party showed no signs of stopping and he staggered into the men’s bathroom in a dark corridor of the building. There was a bathroom closer to the ballroom, but he didn’t want to talk to anyone. He wanted to retch all his shame and fear out with the alcohol and then maybe just go home without saying goodbye. It didn’t matter, really. Nothing mattered all that much.

While he was squatted over the toilet bowl, puking out his guts, the door of the bathroom creaked open. Lu Han heard it, but was too preoccupied to do much. Then the door of his stall banged open. Lu Han had to retch one last time before he was able to turn around and look up. Ahn Sohee stood over him, glaring.

“What the hell?” he asked. Then a wave of nausea overtook him and he had to turn around and puke again.

When he was finished, Sohee stepped back to allow him out of the stall. He hunched over a sink and cupped water in his hand, swishing several mouthfuls around and then spitting it out. Sohee handed him a paper towel after the fifth time, and Lu Han had no choice but to take it and wipe his mouth dry.

“What do you want?” he asked.

Sohee didn’t say anything.

Lu Han knew Ahn Sohee better than most people did, purely because he was good friends with her brother outside of her brother’s parties. He thought she was very cute and very deadly, and the second prevented him from ever saying the first out loud.

“Come on, Sohee, I just want to go home,” he groaned.

“Something’s wrong with you,” Sohee said, her brow furrowed. “And whatever is going on with you is the same thing that’s happening out there.” She pointed in the direction of the ballroom. “And you’re going to tell me everything.”

Lu Han shivered although he wasn’t cold. He ran a hand through his hair, knowing the motion would disrupt the carefully gelled coif he’d had styled for the evening. Telling Sohee anything was dangerous. She put on the appearance of propriety, but respected nothing but some moral code Lu Han could not quite grasp.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said weakly, feeling ill again. He’d heard about Sohee breaking some guy’s nose last year. Maybe that was true.

She titled her head to the side. “You’re terrified,” she said slowly. “What are you afraid of?”

If only Sohee understood. He’d love to have someone to share his secrets with, but he knew he couldn’t. Every single person he knew would have a different idea about what to do with those files hidden in his car and Lu Han had no idea which person would be right.

“Sohee,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper, “This—this is so much bigger than any of us, okay? This isn’t just some fucking shopping mall, or who’s hooking up with who, this is—I can’t tell you, okay?” He felt like he could cry and anxiety shivered so fiercely through him that he couldn’t even find the energy to be embarrassed.

She stepped forward and put her hands on his shoulders. “Lu Han,” she said sternly, but Lu Han could see his own fear reflected in her eyes, “You need to tell me. What’s going on?”

But Lu Han clamped his mouth shut and shook his head. He was shaking badly now and he felt too tired to keep standing. Sohee couldn’t understand how everything was going to go up in flames. And if it didn’t go up in flames? Lu Han didn’t know what he’d do then. Carry the guilt to his grave and arrive at that grave sooner than he should. He kept trying to fool himself that it was all innocent and he wasn’t doing anything bad by just letting everyone get a free pass from his father but he knew that wasn’t true. If the Procurator-General let businesses off without punishment who was to stop them from operating exactly as they wanted? And who even knew what that entailed?

He realized that he’d slumped forward and Sohee had moved so his arm was around her shoulders and she was supporting him. He tried to find his footing but he couldn’t. They managed to walk over to the wall, where Lu Han leaned against the cool tile instead and then slid down to sit on the pristine floor. Only the bathrooms of the rich.

“Oppa?” Sohee was saying into her cell phone. “You need to come help—Lu Han is messed up—”

She said more things but Lu Han closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall. People knew but no one had the evidence Lu Han did and it was up to him to decide whether they all went up in flames.

 

* * *

 

  
  
_#syopinonline Director Wang Feifei moves from socialite to CEO with the launch of the Wang Corporation's online shopping mall_

 

* * *

 

Jia reentered the main ballroom after overseeing the last drunken guests being shoved into limos and driven off. She pulled out her phone as she walked in, scrolling through the instagram feed she and the other event coordinators had been updating over the course of the evening. Already she was shocked by the social media presence the shopping mall had garnered, and she wished the head of the PR department hadn’t insisted on posting a picture of her for the whole world to see. But it was done.

She stood back and got a good look at the room. Even mostly-trashed, the place still looked expensive, worthy of holding the launch of a sure-to-be-lucrative business venture. Jia suddenly realized that she was exhausted, and that Kris had left at some point without telling her goodbye. It didn’t matter. After the stress of planning the event and keeping it running (and dealing with Zitao) Jia didn’t have much energy left for anyone.

Feifei stood in the very center of the room, arms folded over her chest, watching the caterers clean up with a vague, distant look on her face.

Jia walked up to her. “What’s wrong?” she asked. The room felt eerie now that it was so quiet.

Feifei didn’t say anything. Jia had that feeling she got too often with this circle of friends, that she was being locked out of a million secrets, each one darker and more incomprehensible than the next. People thought she didn’t notice things—but she did. She watched Lu Han get progressively more drunk and depressed over the evening. She saw Feifei disappear several times, and with each return she struggled more to keep her pleasant heiress mask in place. She saw Byun Baekhyun make a point of talking to every single important-looking person there, as though it were his personal launch party rather than Feifei’s. She noticed.

“Feifei?” she tried again. Feifei looked up, startled, as though noticing her for the first time. Jia cleared her throat and tried again. “Was the party okay?”

Feifei’s mouth turned down at the corners, but she nodded. “The party was good,” she said definitively.

“Did everything turn out the way you wanted?” Jia asked.

Feifei sighed, and the vague look returned in her eyes. “Not yet,” she said. “Not yet.”


	7. 嘒彼小星

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris attempts to blackmail Feifei into giving up her mission—though he doesn’t know fully yet what that mission is—but Feifei continues her quest for justice with single-minded devotion. And at Lu Han’s birthday party, everyone’s tempers run hot.

嘒彼小星  
_small are those starlets_

 

* * *

 

 

The launch party was a dazzling success.

All because they’d all flouted a million laws to make the online shopping mall happen.

This thought gnawed at Feifei’s conscience for the next week as she oversaw multiple projects related to getting the American branch up and running. Kris, in the meantime, had taken over some of her old projects, and Feifei begrudgingly conceded that he was doing a good job. He had yet to bring up what he overheard her discussing with Byun Baekhyun at the launch—not that she thought he would be able to connect all the dots. But Kris would try to block her whatever direction he thought she was heading, whether he could see the end goal or not.

But of course, Kris couldn’t see the end goal, because even Feifei wasn’t entirely sure what that looked like yet. Zhou Mi had started to quietly invest some of their savings in markets they thought wouldn’t be affected if their corruption became an international scandal. And Zhang Liyin, although she hadn’t given Feifei a wealth of information, knew enough now to make her own plans for her family’s businesses and their associated networks. What Feifei needed now was evidence that pointed to Procurator-General Lu himself. She had a hunch he solicited bribes, but no way to prove it yet. What she needed was to get at Lu Han, somehow.

The answer came in the form of a birthday party invitation. Lu Han was holding a huge bash at his house, like he did every year, but this year he was graduating from law school and inviting all the wealthy socialites in the Los Angeles area. Feifei was surely obligated to go, but she wanted to for once. The Lu mansion had been in the family since the mid-90s, something she knew because Zhou Mi had been raised to love real estate and looked it up out of curiosity. Who knew what could be at that house?

Feifei was putting in long hours at the office, then going home and resuming her studies. Zhou Mi, who always stayed with her in one of the spare suites when he visited Los Angeles (unless he met a new friend), kept scolding her for not getting enough sleep—but Feifei didn’t need sleep. What she needed was a victory.

She was still working through complicated contracts one night when someone knocked on the door to her office. It was already nearly dark out, the sky a dusky blue, and Feifei couldn’t fathom who was still working besides her and the night guards.

The door opened, and Kris shadowed the entrance.

“What are you still doing here?” she asked, not bothering to conceal her irritation. Kris closed the door behind him and smirked at her.

“Thought we should talk,” he said.

The last time they talked in private—Feifei didn’t want to think about that. “You have a girlfriend, now,” she said. “Tread very carefully.”

Kris kept smiling, and shook his head. “Different kind of talk, this time. Sorry to disappoint.”

Feifei closed the file in front of her and stood up. If Kris was here now to spell out his suspicions, she was ready for him. He couldn’t guess the whole plan, and only Zhou Mi knew how far she was willing to go. “Then talk,” she ordered.

Kris was still smiling like he had the upper hand. Feifei wished she’d worn heels, so that he wasn’t able to look down at her, but she could still hold her own. Physical intimidation was only part of the whole puzzle and in spite of his being with Jia, he would still be cowed by his proximity to Feifei just because he couldn’t have her.

“You know, this whole time I thought you were angling for something with Lu Han. But then I had a chat with Byun Baekhyun,” he said. “Sounds like you’re really planning to sabotage Dad’s hard work.”

Feifei rolled her eyes. She knew he said “dad” just to get a rise out of her, but she wouldn’t take the bait. “Byun Baekhyun knows nothing.”

“And yet you looked scared at the launch party when he called you out on it.”

Kris looked very convinced that he had the upper hand here, and Feifei realized she had to surrender a bit of ground if she wanted him to leave.

“You’re so smart,” Feifei said with faux-astonishment. Kris’s upper lip curled with disgust and Feifei slipped back into her natural tone. “Truthfully,” she said carefully. “There are some anomalies in the records. So yes, I might pull the plug. I haven’t decided yet.”

It was a calculated move, meant to give Kris enough to think that he’d won. He blinked, surprised, and she saw that it had worked—he really seemed shocked by what she’d said.

“You can’t stop this,” Kris said, astonished. “It’s too late for that. We’ll lose too much.”

“If we stand to lose down the road because the Byuns can’t play by the rules, then it doesn’t matter.”

Kris didn’t know even a fraction of what Feifei was really considering right now. But even so, his mouth flattened into a disapproving line.

“You want to play hero? Fine.” Kris towered over her and Feifei could only glare up at him. “But keep in mind who all you’re hurting. This is _our_ business, Feifei. We lose here.”

Of course he would try to play that card. Feifei shook her head, almost ready to laugh at him. “It doesn’t matter. This is what’s right, and I’m going to do what I need to. I’ve figured it out, okay? The only people getting hurt are the guilty ones. We lose short term, but we win in the long run.”

“Not if we lose out on this market,” Kris yelled. “You can’t be this stupid! We’re already behind, here, and if we don’t act this whole opportunity could be shot to hell.”

“I don’t care,” Feifei said definitively.

Kris pulled out his phone and started scrolling through it. Feifei didn’t know what to make of that—this was not his normal play.

“If you won’t see reason, then maybe you’ll understand this.” Kris said with gritted teeth, and then he looked up at her. For the first time, Feifei felt her resolve shake. Something was coming, something she should be afraid of.

He held out his phone and Feifei took it. When she saw what was on the screen, she jumped.

“What the hell are you playing at?” she demanded. She tried to swipe away from the image, but the one that replaced it was the same type of content. She clicked the phone off.

“I have eighteen nude photos of Jia,” he said in a tone Feifei could only describe as professional. “Half of them are from before she started her internship, and half of them are from after. You want your friend to have a future in the corporate world? You probably don’t want people thinking she fucked her way there.”

Feifei shook her head. He had her backed into a metaphorical corner and she should have _known_ he’d play dirty but she hadn’t seen this coming at all. “Everyone knows you’re dating her, you idiot.”

“No one in China knows. Her reputation gets questioned, you really think anyone in our circles is going to fight an uphill battle to save her?” His eyebrows lifted. Feifei wanted to punch him.

“I thought you cared about her,” she said in a low voice. She really had. As much as she hated her stepbrother, he _was_ different with Jia. More relaxed. Or maybe he was playing Jia this whole time, too. And Feifei hadn’t done her part to save her.

“Of course I care about her,” Kris said. He took the phone out of Feifei’s hand and pocketed it. “I also care about my future.”

Feifei’s blood was boiling. He hadn’t disrupted her real plan, no. But he’d gotten in a very unfair strike, and right now she couldn’t retaliate without the chance of him guessing there was more on the table than mere “anomalies.”

“I meant it, you know,” she said to him, “When I promised I would hurt you if you hurt her.”

He considered her for a moment. “Well,” he said, “The power to stop me is in your hands right now, isn’t it?” He gave her a smile, and left.

Feifei watched him leave the office. He would pay.

 

* * *

 

Minseok watched as his father angled for a good shot, before swinging away. By any standards it was a mediocre attempt, but he clapped along with everyone else anyway. His father handed the iron over to his caddy with a wide smile and joined him in the golf cart. Even under the shade he was sweating so much that his shirt was soaked through the back. Minseok’s father, though, had made sure that he was thoroughly educated in the concept that playing the little white ball game was effective for forging relationships that were good for everyone involved.

The wind was, at the very least, cool as they drove off towards the next hole. His father was talking about some new spokesperson appointment for their new youth credit card line that they were putting out in conjunction with the Wangs’ online shopping mall; Minseok honestly could not be less interested, but listened halfheartedly anyway. These were all things that Sohee wanted in on, but he really didn’t care for it at all. But because he was the oldest son, Minseok had flown in to New York for the sole reason of playing golf with his father. It was ridiculous, really.

“The Kims might have someone good. Go ask Jongin if he knows if any of their people are suitable for the new image.” His father was used to issuing orders. Whether Minseok took them or not was another thing entirely altogether. Kim Jongin was the youngest son of the biggest entertainment company in Korea, and Minseok wondered why he would know about suitable candidates when in reality his older siblings Hyoyeon and Jongdae were the ones actually working at their company. Then again, Jongin also had millions of girl groups wannabes throwing themselves at him. Minseok knew that Sehun was very interested in how many he actually slept with, but Jongin’s lips were firmly sealed.

“If I happen to meet him back in California, sure.” The cart rolled to a stop and Minseok got out. He could see the mild disapproval on his father’s face. No matter how much he showed his displeasure at being saddled with more and more official duties, his father never did actually get angry at him. It was like they were being patient with a pertinent child. The thought of it pissed Minseok off. “Isn’t Sohee living in the same apartment complex as him?”

His father picked a club from the bag his caddy was holding out for him. “I know how often he appears at those parties of yours, so don’t try to pretend otherwise.” He turned around, expression inscrutable because of his sunglasses, but Minseok could see his father’s mouth set severely in a line. They looked a lot alike whenever they had that expression on. “Your sister doesn’t need to do anything like this.”

Minseok pushed his shades up a little higher. They had slipped down his nose because of the sweat from the intense heat. “You do know that she’s also working at the Los Angeles branch right now, Father?” He grabbed the iron of his choice and stepped aside to let his father play first.

“Your sister,” his father adjusted his posture, “is a princess. Princesses don’t need to-” He swung and the ball flew far out across the green, where it rolled a great distance beyond the hole. Minseok scowled. “Princesses don’t need to do menial work.”

His father glanced at him, and gestured for him to step forward. Minseok breathed out heavily and took his stance. He didn’t hate golfing, but like much of the things that he’d been made to do in his life, he had very little enthusiasm for it. But still he looked in the distance, made a rough estimate, and swung. The ball flew out with a sharp crack, and as they watched, landed on the green and began rolling. Minseok waited impassively as the ball slowed and finally rolled in the hole. Hole-in-one. His father clapped loudly from behind him, and he could hear his caddy congratulating him on a game well played. Minseok grimaced. As if this could translate over to real life.

“Your princess,” he began as they settled in the golf cart again, “doesn’t want to be one. Sohee’s more than capable enough of doing more than whatever she’s doing now.” His sister wanted to be let in on all the important projects, but her chief schedules at work had to do with attending fashion shows and various social events. The media adored her but Sohee despised the socialite title.

His father shrugged. Minseok kept quiet as he went on about raising daughters in one way and sons in another. Pamper your daughters and train your sons to be tough. Minseok thought it was bullshit when it came to Sohee. She wanted to be tough, so all the mollycoddling was unnecessary. But clearly his parents didn’t need or want to understand that their youngest child wanted a life different from the one that they’d thought best for her.

“Just go to Jongin. I want a candidate list by next Monday.” His father’s tone was final. Minseok felt like throwing his club away and stalking off, but all he did was stand by and watch again as his father delivered another average shot. Sometimes, he figured, it was better to pretend that nothing was wrong. Everytime he spoke up a little more for Sohee, she seemed to have to suffer through more of the events she hated so much. It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Minseok knew that this was all part of the game as well. The last person standing would be the one who managed to keep his feet dry. If that was what it was, he would do too much more to keep Sohee as far away from the cesspool as possible.

“I’ll try.” Minseok finally offered, and his father clapped a hand on his shoulder in approval. It was something he didn’t need.

 

* * *

 

Feifei was in the bedroom putting on her earrings when she heard the electronic lock beep open. A few minutes later Zhou Mi entered the room, putting his briefcase down beside the doors of the walk in wardrobe first before walking over to her and giving her a sincere hug. Feifei didn’t say a word. Tonight they were going to Lu Han’s birthday party together. She couldn’t refuse it because Lu Han had invited her, Zhou Mi’s family and Lu Han’s family were old friends, and her father would throw a fit if his stepson went and she didn’t. Wouldn’t do for their image of the perfect family. But most of all, she needed to be there to do some investigating for her own. Lu Han’s place haboured secrets, and she had to get to them. Feifei grimaced, and Zhou Mi must have noticed it.

“Don’t want to go?” He asked, and Feifei kept quiet. Zhou Mi was the only person she could be honest to. After her mother had died, Zhou Mi was the only one who stayed and held her hand through the grief. Her own father was off gallivanting and marrying gold-diggers and taking someone else’s son for his own. “I could tell Lu Han we’re not coming, if you want.”

Feifei shook her head. “I’m good. It’s just a party, and we’ve known Lu Han for forever. He’ll be disappointed if we don’t turn up.” It was a half-truth. If she was to collect any more evidence, Lu Han’s house would be her best bet. Even overhearing a conversation could be possibly incriminating.

“I’ve got his present in the car, though I’m not sure how it compares to his parents’. According to Mom they might just give the kid his own personal island this year.” Zhou Mi shook his head in what seemed to be awe. Zhou Mi’s own family didn’t do this sort of extravagance. In their country they were the rare breed that kept to themselves and hardly socialised. But real estate was something everyone needed, so while they didn’t go to anyone, everyone came to them. Feifei knew her father wanted to be first in line.

“An island.” She frowned. It was incredible that no one ever wondered where Lu Han’s family was getting all their money from. Then again if someone blew the whistle on them, everyone else would be torn apart from the inside. Everyone was connected to everybody in their circle. If one of them fell, no one else would stay unscathed. “Where? I wouldn’t be surprised if they really did get him one.”

Zhou Mi shrugged. “Yeah. But I don’t think he actually wants one, you know? Even a Maserati would be a better choice. What would he do with an _island_?”

Feifei wasn’t sure that a sports car worth the price of an apartment unit would be a good replacement for a private island. But Zhou Mi had already headed into the bathroom and she simply finished putting on her earrings. It took a while before she realised that she had received them for her birthday. Zhou Mi was a person that bought Harry Winston diamond studs for birthday gifts. Suddenly she was hit with the realisation that they were all of the same stock, even if she’d thought herself different for the longest time.

“Feifei?” She jerked back when she felt Zhou Mi tap her on her arm. “Are you okay?” Zhou Mi looked at her, concerned, and Feifei realised that she must have been zoning out in front of the mirror. She nodded too quickly for it to be natural.

“Let’s go. We don’t want to be too late.” Feifei scooped up her bag and said, while she opened the door and they made their way down to the garage.

Zhou Mi unlocked the Aston Martin electronically as they walked towards it. “I heard all of the younger kids are going to be there.” He smiled at her mischieviously as he helped her into the front seat. “Are you ready to party with the youngins?”

Feifei rolled her eyes. Zhou Mi could sound like an old man at times. “We’re not even that much older,” she pointed out, “and besides we don’t have to stay for too long. Do we?” She tried to look hopefully at him. If Zhou Mi thought that she didn’t want to stay long, she could slip out of sight easily and look around the place as soon as possible. He shrugged as he started up the engine.

“Not technically, but I heard Kim Myungsoo is going to be there. His father is the mayor of Seoul, so it might help in our negotiations if I actually _had_ some sort of connection to the son.” He turned smoothly out of the underground carpark. Zhou Mi had told her before about their company trying to advance into the South Korean market. The Koreans were hard to break down, and he’d been working on it for a long time. “Can’t count on Lu Han all the time. Not when he’s not too interested in the family tradition.”

“He’s going to be a lawyer,” Feifei pointed out as they stopped at a junction, “I think that counts as carrying on the family legacy.” A filthy one.

“Yeah, but he wants to work for UNICEF, not become Procurator-General.” Zhou Mi sped up as they turned into a highway. Lu Han’s place was in a very cushy suburb, accessible only by car. “Just be happy for him his father hasn’t found out yet.”

Yes, because who would bring in the dough if Lu Han was to work pro bono? Feifei’s upper lip curled. Her family wasn’t that different, anyway. Knowing her father it was only natural to take whatever people would offer. Turning a blind eye was the trick to getting on top. Lu Han was doing a super job of it. Zhou Mi was talking about something else entirely and when she next opened her eyes, they were already there. Looking at the European style mansion in front of her, Feifei wondered how much it took to buy and maintain. These were things they didn’t bother about normally, but Feifei was in the mood to think about it today.

Zhou Mi cut the gas. “Yixing texted to say that he would be in a corner pretending not to exist.” He laughed and even she had to crack a small smile. Yixing took his awkward social position in the best way possible. Besides, his cousin made sure that nobody actually did try to do anything to him. “But yeah, wishful thinking on his part. Lu Han’s not going to let that happen.”

Feifei stared up at the mansion as Zhou Mi handed the car over to the valet. The house was fully lit up and she could hear the buzz of excitement from where she was standing. This world seemed unnaturally real, when Feifei knew that it was just a bubble. Someone could burst it open anytime. Maybe it would be her.

“I sure hope so.” She muttered as Zhou Mi took her hand and they walked over to where the party awaited.

 

* * *

 

If Oh Sehun could have his way, he would design cars for a living. But as it turned out he was actually born into a family of construction, and cars would have to take a backseat to blueprints of buildings. Everyone in the family was expected to be an architect, and Sehun sometimes wondered why his older brother had to set the bar so damn high. Oh Segyun didn’t think to leave some space for his younger brother to show off. How fucking mean, Sehun thought sometimes, but he didn’t try to care too much about it. He’d rather devote more time to collecting cars and paintings than try and mope around about how fantastic his brother was compared to him. Sometimes sleeping around helped too. Actually, it helped all the time. Sehun wasn’t choosy.

He had a hard time choosing an impressive car to drive to Lu Han’s party. Lu Han was a cool guy to hang out with, but he also had far more connections than the rest of them did. There were only so many tubs of cosmetics (Baekhyun), cups of instant noodles (Chanyeol), and LED nodes (Zitao) that he could use in so many situations. Lu Han, though, was a politician’s son. That opened as many doors as he wanted. Mostly Sehun just wanted to score with the Italian car makers, but Lu Han was also a good friend. His father constantly reminded him to be on friendly terms with the Chinese kids, even if they didn’t like them too much, and Sehun listened if he benefited from it as well.

He turned into the driveway of Lu Han’s elaborate mansion. Apparently he lived here with Zhang Yixing, the guy from some lower branch of a Chinese mining family. Sehun wondered if they slept with each other. The tires of his orange Lamborghini screeched as he pulled up the handbrake and slid smoothly out of the driver’s seat. He tossed his keys at the valet, who only barely caught onto them. Private valet service at a party. Yeah, Lu Han was fucking rich all right. Sehun shrugged and jogged towards the main entrance, where he could see the glint of Byun Baekhyun’s blonde hair. As he got closer he could see the girl next to him, dark haired and petite in the standard good rich girl way—Irene Bae. Seemed like they had gotten back together again. Baekhyun and Irene had an extremely volatile relationship that was good for gossip fodder but extremely dangerous to witness in person. Sehun had the unfortunate experience once, and spent the next month actively avoiding the both of them.

“‘Sup hyung.” Sehun slung his arms around the two of them. “I see we’re all early.”

Baekhyun grinned, but pushed his arm off Irene. “I’m always early.” Sehun raised an eyebrow and kept walking.

A server greeted them at the door, where they were served flutes of champagne. Sehun eyed them carelessly for a moment, and when he looked back both Baekhyun and Irene had disappeared. Probably to make out and have angry make-up sex, he thought. Lu Han’s place had more than enough rooms for them to do that uninterrupted. There were already people milling around the main hall, but no one else he knew had arrived yet. Zitao was in the habit of being continually late to everything, and Chanyeol liked appearing at random inopportune moments.

So Sehun wandered around for a while more, pushing doors open and venturing deeper into the house. It was a pretty one, and he was interested in looking at the blueprint if Lu Han would let him. The thought made him pause for a moment. He was really more whipped into shape by his family than he’d like to let on. Thinking about blueprints while he was at a party? Fucking ace. Sehun took another flight of stairs down and briefly toyed with the idea of breaking into Lu Han’s garage before he realised that it was likely to fail and set off multiple alarms, then climbed back up again and ascended until he’d reached the third floor. There he managed to find his way into the library, where there actually were armchairs situated behind a few shelves. Kinky, Sehun thought. Maybe this would be good for some voyeuristic fucking, but he wasn’t really in the mood.

His grandfather had made another hint at the division of their inheritance today. Sehun wasn’t excluded, but was going to likely get as as much as his baby brother would. Seyun was six. He was twenty fucking one. Sehun loved Seyun like the next brother would, but sometimes Grandfather was so damn unfair. Segyun was already rising through the ranks as he sat here, half empty champagne flute in hand, and was going to be made general manager next or something. The truth was, Sehun didn’t hate his brother, no, but the feeling of always being second rate was fucking shitty. His parents always seemed to look at him fondly as the family wastrel. Sehun snorted. Maybe having the largest car collection in Korea did have that effect but whatever. Didn’t mean he didn’t have what it took to be part of the empire they thought only Segyun could pull together. That was why he liked being in the States more than he did when in Seoul. His cooing mother was loving but it would get on his nerves more often than he’d prefer. Besides, Sehun liked not having to think about Grandfather clucking his tongue over his constant deferral of military service and talking about how accomplished Segyun was when he was in the Navy. Oh Sehun too needed a fucking break sometimes.

He’d finished the champagne when the door slammed open. Sehun jumped a little, but collected his wits quickly. This was potentially going to be very good, judging from the way the two people who had entered were breathing in that short, angry manner. Sehun could see them very well from where he was seated—the gaps between the books gave him a great view of the action. He recognised the two almost immediately as the Ahn siblings when they turned around. Ahn Minseok was a close friend of his brother’s, and his parties were legendary. Almost as legendary was his sister’s refusal to attend any of those. Ahn Sohee was continually breaking Chanyeol’s heart because she wouldn’t RSVP to anything, but clearly she didn’t give a fuck. Sehun silently applauded her for that.

He observed as they seemed to passive-aggressively argue about whether Minseok was going to that meeting and whether Sohee would stop “being so pushy” and “just leave Lu Han alone because it’s not our business”. Sehun nodded a little in agreement. He and she had been in the same high school and now university, and Sohee was the poster girl of self restraint. He suspected this inclination for haughtiness to be the reason why Chanyeol constantly hovered around her, nonstop if he could. Chanyeol was fucking obsessed with her but she never gave him the light of day. Once again Sehun gave her a standing ovation for that. Minseok had turned on his heel in that moment then, and Sehun watched as Sohee gripped her brother’s arm and said something too quiet for him to hear. She looked like she was about to cry. That was a first.

Sehun had never talked much to Sohee when they were in school, he’d merely watched from afar. Sohee was beautiful in a way that was meant to be seen from a distance. Their families had business dealings together, and he attended most of the parties Minseok threw, but Sohee was firmly out of bounds. He had seen the way she rebuffed people, thought about how he’d never want to be in a situation like that because Sehun didn’t deal well with rejection, and pretty much left her alone afterwards. Only somebody stupid (like Park Chanyeol) would constantly try to get on her nerves in order to gain a bit of attention, but Sehun wasn’t that sort of person. Not at least until he had seen her crestfallen face now, after Minseok walked out on her and the door slammed behind him. The poor, rich girl in Alexander McQueen and Christian Louboutins. Sehun actually felt some semblance of pity when he saw that she was trying her best not to cry.

He debated on giving up his place behind the shelves but the door opened again. Chanyeol’s head poked in and he could see his eyes light up when he realised that Sohee was alone. Sehun frowned a little but continued to watch. Chanyeol being smacked down was always satisfying but this time he found the guy annoying. He watched as Chanyeol, tall and all suited up, laid a hand on Sohee’s shoulder. She shook him off almost immediately but not in an irritated way. She seemed far too distracted for that. He said something in her ear too softly for Sehun to catch, and Sohee whirled around to glare up at him so hard that he swore he saw Chanyeol momentarily tremble. Sehun snorted softly. Well played. Chanyeol looked hurt, even, but slowly backed off. Should have done that right from the start, Sehun thought. Then again Chanyeol couldn’t read moods too well.

Sohee had sunk into a chair near the other rows of shelves after Chanyeol had closed the door behind him. Sehun continued to watch as she wrapped her hands around the back of her head and looked down at her knees. Even sitting down she had stunning legs. Sehun cleared his throat and she shot right back up.

“Who’s there?” Sohee called out. He could see the guardedness in her eyes. All of them Korean kids looked like that sometimes. Reporters could be aggressive in the motherland. “Hello?”

He decided to give himself up. “Hi.” Sehun picked up his empty glass and walked out from behind the shelves. She looked stunned, and then like she wanted to swing a fist at him. Sehun wasn’t exactly sorry for eavesdropping. He hardly felt sorry for anything, as a matter of fact. A lot of things that people had to bend themselves over for didn’t exist for him. He was sure that it was the same for Sohee, but today it might be different. He had seen a side of her that she would love to keep under wraps, and to a person like her it was tantamount to giving him a free pass to threaten her with. Sehun felt a slight pity but pushed it away soon enough. “Haven’t seen you in a while.”

“I’d think you would find that a relief.” Her voice was quietly venomous. Sehun was sure that she had already put two and two together. Not that it really mattered.

“If you appeared at Minseok hyung’s parties more often, we would see each other very frequently.” He shrugged and grinned at her, before plopping himself down on the chair next to her. He saw her arm twitch. She probably wanted to bolt out of the room now, but dignified children of the Korean _chaebols_ didn’t do that sort of thing. Sehun found it crazy that they still needed to believe that Joseon-style rules still applied to daily life, but he was also willing to let it slide. As long as they were good in bed.

She smiled. It didn’t reach her eyes. “I don’t like wasting my life away.”

How harsh. Sehun whistled and she glared at him. “You do know that your brother’s parties are extremely hard to get into, right? Be proud.” He honestly found it something to be proud of. Segyun would never be able to organise parties of Minseok’s standard. Hedonism wasn’t exactly Segyun’s thing, because it was Sehun’s, but he was also too lazy to make sure that it would work in a party setting. Minseok though, was a genius at both. Sehun had to give him credit for that.

“I’m sure your parents are proud of you.” Sohee wasn’t sneering but he knew what she meant. She had gone straight for the jugular. Very clever, he thought, because it did fucking hurt. It also caught him by surprise, so he blanked out for a few seconds before he grinned again. Smiling was Sehun’s forte. It got him everything and everyone he wanted. Clearly it didn’t apply to Sohee at all. “Listening in on to someone else’s conversation is definitely something to be proud of. Of course it is.”

“Bet Chanyeol hyung wishes he could see you now.” He muttered and Sohee smiled humourlessly. She got up from the chair, smoothed the wrinkles of her blue dress, and walked towards the heavy doors. He raised an eyebrow. So heartless. “Does he know you’re such a character, Sohee?”

She paused, before turning back slowly and tilting her head to the side. Sehun’s pulse skipped a beat. She really was beautiful. No wonder Chanyeol was obsessed. He watched as she placed a foot behind her as she leaned on the brass handles of one of the doors. The dress was cut to the middle of her thigh and he found him admiring her legs again. Sehun was a visual beast and he found no need to deny it. The woman was hot.

“Depends.” She shrugged and pushed down on the handle. The door clicked open. “I don’t give a damn.”

Chanyeol would be heartbroken. Sehun raised his empty glass in salute. She did a little curtsey, and pulled the door open. He watched as the dress rode up a little as she stood back up. Now it was easy to see where the attraction lay in her. Sehun shifted in his seat, slightly uncomfortable.

“And you’d better damn well call me nuna.” She narrowed her eyes at him, and then stepped out.

 

* * *

 

Zitao arrived at the Lu mansion slightly late, and exhausted. He only came here because it was Lu Han—who he liked quite well and had known since they were kids. And he couldn’t piss off the Procurator-General’s son. That was a habit ingrained in him since he was small. Be nice to Lu-ge, his mother always said. Play whatever he wants to play. Don’t talk back to him. Old habits died hard.

He walked into the spacious foyer and looked around. People milled around in every corner, still pretending at propriety at this point in the evening. Debauchery came later. It had its proper place, after the sun went down and the majority of the guests were drunk. Now that he was forbidden from drinking, Zitao could sit back and actually mark the point in the evening when people allowed themselves to shift from their proper rich selves to their gross rich selves. If he could ever get himself in a better mood, it would be amusing, but really he just felt like an outsider, watching his old crowd.

Sehun appeared down the stairs, a very odd smile on his face. Zitao stopped, his hands in the pockets of his Ermenegildo Zegna suit, to wait for him.

“You look happy,” Zitao commented when Sehun came up to him. Sehun’s grin turned bashful, then a bit lecherous.

“You ever taken a good look at Ahn Sohee’s legs?” he asked. Zitao snorted.

“She has great legs, but you’re never going to touch them,” Zitao laughed. “And even if she let you, Minseok would murder you. Her legs aren’t _that_ great.”

“Did you know she got sued for punching a guy back in Korea last year?” Sehun asked eagerly. “It’s kind of hot, right?”

Zitao rolled his eyes. Sehun with a crush was an indefatigable puppy. He bit down hard on the stick and refused to let go, usually until the stick was in splinters and his chance had long since evaporated.

They stepped through the large living room and outside, walking down the stairs to the large, spacious pool. Some of the others were sitting around a fire pit, Lu Han in the center, looking very thin and on-edge. He and Sehun walked up to join them, and only then did Zitao notice that Jia was sitting on one of the couches, her hand intertwined with Kris’s.

“Sick party,” Sehun commented, flopping down on a couch and gesturing for one of the plates of hors devours sitting on an end table. “I ran into your sister,” he said to Minseok. “She’s in a bad mood.”

Minseok rolled his eyes and Zitao sat down next to Sehun, very aware that Jia was not looking at him or acknowledging him at all. Sehun gave him the platter and Zitao ate one of the little snacks. He didn’t even know what it was besides being salmon, but it tasted expensive.

“She’s always pissed off,” Minseok said. Zitao elbowed Sehun, to make his point from earlier, and strangely Sehun didn’t react. Maybe he could keep a secret when it suited him.

Then Kris got up and went into the pool house, leaving Jia alone. Zitao cleared his throat.

“You look nice,” he said to her, for lack of anything better to say. She really did. She had enough style that she didn’t look out of place with the rest of them, all dressed to the nines by personal stylists. She’d done something with her hair that Zitao couldn’t really identify, but he could tell that it made her look softer, which meant she was probably trying to blend in. Look the part of the rich girlfriend even if she couldn’t change the rich part. Gone were the days of dyed-pink or orange hair.

“I’m still not talking to you,” she announced.

The rest of the circle gave her an odd look, but Jia didn’t seem to notice. It took Zitao a minute to realize what her mistake was—she shouldn’t be so blunt. The rest of them fought with their emotions buried underneath masks of pure civility. Zitao had always been bad at that, which was probably why he was friends with Jia in the first place.

Zitao couldn’t even find it within himself to snap back a retort. Instead he just sank back into the couch and listened to the others laugh. Watched Sehun drink and then, when Kris came back with Feifei on his heels, them drink too. He felt like a dark cloud was hanging over him and every time someone splashed into the pool, he felt ill.

 

* * *

 

Nothing irritated Feifei quite so much as watching Yifan stroke Jia’s back, his fingers pulling gently through her hair. She watched Jia lean into him, and Fei could just imagine the happy, satisfied looks on their faces—she was happy she couldn’t see them, because then she’d be more annoyed. Jia didn’t have a clue how Kris was willing to use her. And Feifei couldn’t tell her.

They were sitting outside around the “campfire,” as Lu Han referred to the built-in fire pit that surely cost thousands of dollars to install. Feifei was in the pool house kitchen, making a drink for herself as slowly as possible. There was no way she could endure this party even fall-down drunk, and she never _got_ fall-down drunk, so she was just going to avoid as much of it as possible. She really hated Kris for making her such a terrible, unhappy person. Zhou Mi suggested that she was at fault for her own unhappiness, but since the alternative was watching Kris destroy both her fortune and her best friend, she didn’t have much choice. She had too many things on her plate, the biggest one being how to snoop around the Lu mansion without being seen. Trying to get Jia to dump Kris had to come second.

“Are you okay?”

Feifei jumped about a foot and turned around to glare at Kris. “I’m fine,” she said. “Just making myself a drink.”

“Me too.” He stepped up beside her and started looking through the bottles of alcohol lined up on the counter. A number of Korean voices echoed from another part of the house, and Feifei sighed involuntarily. She actually liked Lu Han well enough, but the company he kept frustrated her. Only the Zhangs were okay, and even then.

“Cheer up, Feifei. You’re at a party.” Kris flashed a smile at her and Feifei resumed working on her drink, which at this point was mostly ice that she’d put in one cube at a time.

“It’s hard to sit around and watch you cuddle with my best friend when I know you’d turn on her in a second,” Fei said in a pleasant voice. Accordingly, Kris laughed.

“Pretty sure she wants to be here. What she doesn’t know can’t hurt her.” He smiled at her again and Fei smiled back, because this was what they _did_ —act the part of civil stepsiblings whether what they said matched or not.

“Eventually, she’ll see who you really are,” Fei said in a faux-gentle voice, reaching across him for a bottle she wanted. She could feel him bristle as she infringed on his space. “And I’m hoping she breaks your heart at the same time.”

Kris didn’t say anything for a long moment. Fei watched the alcohol pour into the glass, almost eager for his response.

“You could always speed up the process,” Kris said softly. “Tell her the truth about us.”

Fei laughed—a genuine, incredulous laugh. “Us? There is no us.”

Kris smirked down at her. “I have several very vivid memories that say otherwise.”

Fei kept smiling and shook her head at him. “It’s very cute that you think oral sex counts for anything,” she said in a voice dripping with condescension. If she could have reached his head easily, she would pat it.

He took a sip of his drink and held her gaze. “Yeah, well, I wasn’t the one on my knees.”

“And I’m not the one still thinking about it.” She titled her glass in his direction and they stared each other down. Finally, he blinked, and looked away. A good match. She was still winning. She walked outside, holding the door open for him as she went, since he had two drinks in his hands. He gave one to Jia as they sat down, and Fei settled herself next to Lu Han on one of the plush couches. The sky was a brilliant dark blue. Beautiful night.

“Everything okay?” Jia asked innocently. “You all were in there for a while.”

“Just catching up with my brother,” Fei said. Kris met her eyes with a glare, and Fei smiled back.

After a while, it was time to present gifts to Lu Han. Word spread throughout the party and slowly people began drifting to one of the main rooms.

“Here we go,” Lu Han sighed, and pushed himself up off the couch. Feifei watched him steady himself as he stood up. He looked a bit thin and wan, the usual perfect edges of his clothes wrinkled, his eyes constantly darting around. Feifei wondered what all this meant, if anything. For all she knew, he could have an addiction to hard drugs—it was Los Angeles, after all. Then again, it could all be connected, every one of them suffering the fallout of their parents’ decisions. Feifei had no way to know.

When the pool deck and eating areas were clear, Feifei drifted behind the rest, slowly working her way to the edges of the party. She followed everyone to the main living room where they were congregating, but stopped before she went in. Im Yoona, a girl she knew only by association, noticed her and gave her a questioning look.

“I need to go to the bathroom,” Feifei explained sheepishly. “That time of the month.”

Yoona nodded and put her finger in front of her lips in a “shh” gesture and winked. Feifei grinned, and disappeared down the hall.

She guessed she had about a half hour. This was the only time she could search Lu Han’s house unnoticed, because the rest of the party guests would be at the gift giving, trying to impress Lu Han with their purchases. During the rest of the party most of the rooms would be filled up, so if she tried to go into a bedroom alone, people would look at her suspiciously. And it wasn’t like she could pretend she and Zhou Mi were sneaking into a bedroom to fool around.

She would start with Lu Han’s bedroom. That seemed like the best bet. She didn’t think Lu Han was a particularly sneaky person, so anything personal he would probably hide in a dresser drawer or under his mattress.

She made her way up to the third floor and tapped carefully on Lu Han’s door. Then she opened it and slid inside. His cat trotted up to her and she gave it a few affectionate pats on the head.

“Just between us, right?” she asked it. It purred, winding around her legs, and Feifei stood up and looked around.

 

* * *

 

They gathered in the biggest room that Lu Han’s place had to offer for the present gifting. Minseok took a seat in the corner as he watched the party goers file in. Many he recognised and even more he wasn’t bothered to talk to. Lu Han’s connections were wider than any of theirs, but Minseok also thought it was due to everyone wanting to get a piece of him. Sohee had emerged through the doors and turned away almost immediately when she saw him. Fine by him. Minseok frowned until Yixing sat down beside him, nursing a glass of what he was sure was non-alcoholic.

“Does it have to be this way?” Yixing asked and Minseok shrugged absentmindedly. “This is so juvenile. Everyone presenting their gifts to Lu Han like he’s a seven year old.”

“How else are they going to get into his good books?” Minseok grabbed the glass from Yixing and gulped. It was indeed not of the alcoholic variety and tasted like apple juice. He gagged and shoved it back into Yixing’s hands.

Lu Han was sitting in the center, and Minseok thought he looked a little paler and more listless than usual. Maybe it was the stress of his final year in law school getting to him. Or maybe he just was overdoing the whole self-healing with nicotine thing. Minseok had spotted a nicotine patch on the inside of his wrist just now. Yixing let slip earlier that he was using them so frequently that he used up two boxes every three days. Minseok was sure that it was definitely not compliant with any doctor’s instructions, but then as long as Lu Han knew what he was doing it was fine by him. The guy was turning twenty five today, anyhow.

“Thanks for coming guys. Means a lot to me.” Lu Han’s smile was a little off, but nobody else seemed to notice. Minseok clapped along with everyone and spotted Sohee actually sitting near Chanyeol. She must be really mad at him, then. Somebody yelled that it was time for Lu Han to show off his presents, and Minseok sat back as they started off on the other side of the room.

There was a lot of YSL and Burberry, which Minseok knew Lu Han liked and used frequently as opposed to say, Jongdae, who didn’t know anything about the different fashion houses and just wore whatever his stylist gave him. Baekhyun had actually brought two pieces from Chanel’s latest runway collection, and Minseok laughed at the weird look Lu Han gave him.

Segyun, one of his oldest friends and the elder Oh brother, couldn’t be here today so Sehun represented them by stuffing a box into Lu Han’s hands and looking as cocky as he could. Minseok raised an eyebrow—Sehun was the more flamboyant of the Oh siblings. Maybe one day he could be surpassed by the youngest, but Seyun was only six.

“Hyung says happy birthday. He also said you’d like the Hablot.” Sehun gave Lu Han a pat on the shoulder and Lu Han returned it a little awkwardly. Lu Han and Minseok were both close to Segyun, but he was now more frequently based in Seoul than in Los Angeles. Plus, Minseok reckoned, Sehun was always a little on the weird side. “And he _also_ said you’d like it for being limited edition. Ninety-seven thousand, that’s all I’m saying.”

There was a ripple of murmurs around the room. Sehun had definitely said it to get a reaction, but Minseok was ambivalent. The Ohs also banked with them, and he had a very good idea of what they were worth. This price wasn’t anything much to them, and Segyun probably bought the watch out of his own pocket. Sehun looked pleased and slightly drunk as he slid back to where Zitao was, and they exchanged high-fives.

Next to them were Kris, and Jia was nestled at his side. Minseok watched as Kris handed a bottle of red wine over, and Yixing went “From 1990?” beside him. Clever, Minseok thought. Kris was always just thoughtful enough, to the point that people found him tasteful but not overbearing.

“Happy birthday, Lu Han.” Jia said and stood up to give him a hug. Minseok could see Lu Han freeze for a moment before gingerly tapping on her back in thanks. “I hope you’ll have a great year.”

Lu Han mumbled something that he couldn’t hear in reply, and Jia took a small box out of her purse. She handed it over to him and smiled. It was small and square, with no visible logos that Minseok could see or identify. Opposite he could see Sohee eyeing the box with much interest, but as soon as she saw him looking she turned away with a scowl. Minseok thought it was okay if she found Chanyeol a more acceptable option to look at for now, because Sohee would have to deal with the consequences for it later.

“Thanks.” Lu Han sounded slightly warmer now, and took the box from her. He opened it and picked up a leather collar that had a golden heart pendant hanging from it. Minseok presumed it was for his cat, the one that Lu Han had bought a few years ago from a breeder at some exaggeratedly high price. Pureblood, he’d argued. Minseok still found it stupid. “Is this for Mew Mew? Thanks. I’ve been looking for one.”

“Yeah, Yixing said that it’d be useful.” Jia grinned and Lu Han looked like he was genuinely happy to receive the present. Minseok elbowed Yixing and he returned the jab. He didn’t know that the two of them were this close, but Yixing was looking steadfastly into the distance and didn’t seem to want and reply any questions. Minseok could bide his time, no problem. “Glad you like it.”

Lu Han nodded and was putting the collar back into the box when Baekhyun reached over to grab it out of his hand. “Nice. Did you make it yourself?” He asked with a grin, one that Minseok recognised immediately with ringing alarm bells to be a very dangerous sign. But Jia had no prior experience with Baekhyun, and simply nodded kindly. Baekhyun made a face of wonderment, and dropped it back into the box. Lu Han didn’t look too happy, because he almost certainly knew what Baekhyun was up to.

“Very intricate. You do give Chinese sweatshop workers a good name.”

But even Minseok hadn’t expected Baekhyun to say something like that. He was grinning at Jia, who had frozen on the spot. The room had quietened to a buzzing sort of silence, and Minseok heard Yixing draw a sharp intake of breath beside him. Opposite them he could see Zitao gaping at Baekhyun in horror. Sehun looked like he had been caught off guard. Kris was expressionless. Minseok himself was disturbed at Baekhyun’s complete lack of tact. Jia looked like she wanted to say something, but the edge of her mouth simply twitched. Baekhyun continued smiling like he was waiting for an answer.

Then Sehun rose from his seat almost immediately, pushing the ends of his suit jacket aside, before Zitao reacted a second later and caught him by the arm. He looked the angriest that Minseok had ever seen him be. Out of the corner of his eye Minseok could see Sohee watching, an odd expression on her face. Sehun opened his mouth presumably to say something rude, but Kris cut in before he could.

“Watch it, Byun.” Kris’s eyes were burning but his tone was cold. “This is not the time to be running your mouth off like this.”

Baekhyun raised an eyebrow at Kris. “Defending your little fuck buddy, Wu?”

Yixing bristled and Minseok pressed down on his knee. This was not their fight. Jia had blanched pale and Kris looked like he was contemplating punching Baekhyun in the face. But instead it was Lu Han who spoke up, his voice levelly acerbic.

“Don’t fuck up the party, Baekhyun.” Baekhyun shrugged. Lu Han shot him a cold look. “This isn’t Korea.”

“I was under the impression that this is much freer of a country than Korea.” Baekhyun spread his arms out, palms faced upwards. A muscle in Kris’s face twitched. “Or China, for that matter.”

Yixing stood up and flung his hand off so fast that Minseok almost fell over. “You need to stop, right now. It’s not your place to say anything like this.” Yixing was so angry that his ears had turned red. Minseok wanted to clamp a hand over his mouth. This was only going to bait Baekhyun, and Baekhyun was unstoppable whenever he thought he was being presented with a challenge.

Baekhyun raised an eyebrow. “And it’s yours, because you happen to leech off Lu Han here? Must be family tradition.”

Minseok saw Yixing’s fist clench tightly and knew that he was about to erupt. He pulled himself up using Yixing’s arm and narrowed his eyes at Baekhyun. He tilted his head in a sort of small, mocking greeting back. Minseok saw Irene behind Baekhyun, suddenly, and she looked like she was in a lot of pain. There were a lot of rumours about Irene being a long-suffering girlfriend, but Minseok knew that she didn’t leave because she didn’t want to. It was her choice. Baekhyun smiled again and Minseok pressed down harder on Yixing’s arm.

“You will stop now.” Minseok said calmly. “Before your father gets wind of your favourite ways to get high during parties.”

Baekhyun blinked. Beyond him Minseok could see his sister’s impassive face, but he knew she was impressed somewhat. Sohee never liked Baekhyun too much, and Minseok secretly approved. Irene had risen out of her seat to stand slightly behind her boyfriend. Baekhyun blinked again.

“At your parties, hyung?” He said finally, like a comeback.

Minseok felt the cruelty rise within him. “At my parties where I explicitly said I’d report anyone doing drugs. You’re testing my patience, Baekhyun. Leave the room. Now.”

Baekhyun’s face was blank, as he seemed to consider the better option to take. Then Irene went forward and took his hand. He didn’t even look back, just held her hand and stood there like he was still thinking about it. They had a sick relationship, Minseok thought as Yixing breathed heavily beside him. It took a while before Baekhyun nodded slowly and pulled Irene out of the room. As he walked past Kris he must have mouthed something, because Kris suddenly pulled an arm back and punched him squarely in the face. Jia yelped, and Lu Han rushed forward to hold Kris back. Zitao did the same. Chanyeol had instinctively put an arm in front of Sohee. Then the room was silent before somebody let out a bark of laughter. It sounded like Sehun.

“Fucking get out of my sight before I punch you again, you son of a bitch.” Kris growled, and Baekhyun stood up, a horrified Irene helping him up. He didn’t say anything afterwards and simply walked out. Minseok watched as Irene propped him up and turned the corner. He turned back towards the center of the room, and Lu Han caught his gaze. His friend looked like he wanted to order everyone to leave. But Lu Han pressed the buzzer for his butler instead, and the tenseness slowly melted away into nothing. Everything seemed normal now.

But Minseok watched as Jia slipped out of the room, stumbling a little, with Kris following shortly. Yixing’s arm was still straining against his grip. Minseok let go and Yixing looked around at him for a moment, a little lost, before he looked back at the hallway where Jia and Kris had disappeared into.

“You going?” Minseok asked as the butler arrived. Lu Han looked exhausted as he pointed out the blood drops on the carpet. Kris must have broken something in Baekhyun’s face.

Yixing remained quiet. “Maybe not.” He said finally, and then sank back down slowly into his seat. Minseok didn’t ask any more questions afterwards.

 

* * *

 

Feifei had almost given up and headed back to the party when she took a second look at the notebook lying on Lu Han’s desk.

She picked it up and looked more closely. It had been closed, but a pen was stuck between the pages, and when she opened it she saw a list of characters running down the page: _Wang, Song, Huang, Zhou, Li, Lau,_ and on it ran for three pages. At the end it said: _the driver of the getaway car still has to go to jail._

The rest of the pages were blank, save for a few shopping lists and some half-hearted sketches of a car. Feifei set the notebook down on the desk and realized her hands were trembling. She knew she was close, now—the surnames in the book did not count as evidence, but she was on the right track. If this was everything, she could predict the fallout of the scandal going public. She dug her phone out of her pocket and snapped pictures of the pages. What she would need now was real evidence. She had a feeling Lu Han had it, but she didn’t know where to look.

Quietly, Feifei stole back to the party. She arrived just in time to see Kris punch Baekhyun in the face, and then for Jia and Kris and Baekhyun and Irene to all leave. She looked at Zhou Mi, but he just shook his head. She’d find out later.

After a few minutes the party resumed, and Feifei tried to keep her mind on the gifts being given to Lu Han, but all she could think about was how they were miming what their parents did to his father for years. And if their parents had any say, it would continue this way indefinitely.


	8. 維參與昴

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jia learns the secrets of Kris's past, Sohee keeps trying to figure out what her brother Minseok is determined to keep from her, Lu Han heads further toward a nervous breakdown, and Feifei receives a warning to stop her mission—or else.

維參與昴  
 _orion and the pleiades beside them_

 

 

The Lu mansion had dozens of rooms but it took Jia a while to find one where she was sure she wouldn’t be disturbed. She ended up in an odd office, tucked away in what was probably intended to be maid’s quarters. She closed the door behind her and sunk down into the oversized leather couch fitted beside the ornate desk and bookcases. She felt numb. The wealth evident even in this small room could neither impress her nor bother her.

Jia had no deep desire to be rich. She liked designer clothes and she liked the vast mansions her friends owned, but the more time she spent with their wealth, the less she needed any of it. She was just fooling herself, thinking she could belong here. You apparently had to be raised to be a special kind of screwed up to enjoy being rich.

Baekhyun’s murmured comment, the one that earned him a broken nose by Kris’s fist, kept rattling around in her head. _“How much do you pay for your cheap whore?”_ But she couldn’t drudge up any emotion. It just stayed there, rattling, shaking her down into her bones.

She didn’t feel like crying. She felt like going home, but there was no way to walk home from an estate deliberately secluded from the rest of the city. If she could find someone to drive her, that would be good, but she didn’t want to ask anyone to take time out from the party. Going to Kris after that fight would make it seem like she was beaten down, even though he’d defended her. Feifei she hadn’t seen in hours. She refused to talk to Zitao, and Sehun was probably drunk by now. Yixing might drive her. When she worked up the energy, she’d go find him.

Someone knocked and the door opened. She was surprised to see Kris in the doorway, and suddenly a wave of affection flooded through her. “Hey,” she said, a smile twitching upwards on her lips.

“Hey. Are you okay?” He closed the door behind him and came to sit next to her on the couch. She moved over and rested her head on his shoulder, taking a deep breath and absorbing the comfort of having him next to her.

“I’m okay,” she said. “Thanks for sticking up for me.”

There was a window on the opposite wall looking out to the manicured lawns. She could see the edges of the sunset, and she felt very calm. Truly okay. He wrapped his large hand around hers and she looked at the lines of his veins, the strong bones of his fingers.

“It reminded me of high school,” Kris said. Something about the tone of his voice made her move back to get a better look at him. He had a strange, far-away expression, now. She’d never seen him look so sad.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

He laughed and rubbed his palm against the back of his neck. His grip on her hand tightened.

“In high school,” he said, “My mom and I moved back to China. She enrolled me in this International School. Prestigious—the kind of place kids like Lu Han go if they’re not actually overseas.”

Jia put her other hand over his. She’d never heard him sound so vulnerable, and it scared her and strengthened her resolve all at once.

“Some of these kids didn’t like me,” Kris said. “I didn’t care. I played basketball for the school team. I did okay. I didn’t need their approval. But they hated me and wouldn’t leave me alone. Started digging around on the internet. Eventually they tracked down my father.”

He stopped talking. Jia knew she shouldn’t say anything now, couldn’t, but she wished she could break through whatever spell lay over him. His past pain was palpable in the room. And she couldn’t do a thing to lessen it.

“My mother’s side is the Wus,” he explained, with a smile that wasn’t at all happy. “Great social connections. Not wealthy enough. My dad’s side is the Lis. You may have heard of them, maybe not.”

Jia shook her head and Kris’s eyebrows lifted, somewhere between acquiescence and bitterness.

“In the mid-nineties my dad went to jail for trying to blackmail some bigwig in Beijing,” he said. He laughed a little, again. “Before that, he was basically royalty in Guangzhou. Controlled half the industry—factories, shipping, you name it, he had his hands in it. Then he got cocky and the whole thing came crashing down around him.”

He rubbed his hand over his face. Jia wanted to say something but she sat, spellbound, as all the pieces of Kris’s past started falling in place in front of her. From his tone, she doubted even Feifei knew all this. It might be the first time he had ever spoken of it.

“My mom made me change my name, and she worked to basically erase any trace of who my dad was, but I guess some of these kids’ parents remembered. Anyway, it was just stuff they’d heard from their parents. But when Baekhyun said that about you,” he looked up at her with a bitter smile, “It made me think of those kids. They slap a label on a person and try to destroy you with their words. No one should ever hear that kind of bullshit. Especially not you.”

Jia still didn’t know what to say, so instead she pulled his hand up and pressed her lips against the back of it. She’d absorb all his pain if she could. It was her worst trait, wanting to care for people whether they could be helped or not.

“It’s all in the past,” she said softly. She blinked back the feeling of tears and looked up at him, making herself smile so that he would know she was okay, and he was okay, and they would be strong together. “Don’t think about it anymore. I’m not thinking about what Baekhyun said, either. Don’t think about it.”

“Okay,” he agreed. He pulled her close and kissed her, a long and deep kiss, the kind that made her heart beat fiercely in her chest. Up until now everything they did together had been for fun. It all happened at a frenetic pace. This time, she could believe they were really connecting. The kind of deep, emotional connection she craved, but rarely made, and never with Kris. It scared her and thrilled her all at once.

They went on kissing and she leaned back into the couch, the weight of his body resting on top of her. One of his hands slid under her skirt and she pulled away from him and stopped his hand.

“You want to have sex in Lu Han’s house?” she asked, incredulous. Jia could not call herself prudish—too many experiences in her life proved her to be otherwise—but she didn’t want to have sex in a veritable stranger’s house, no matter what she let men believe she was willing to do.

“No one’s going to know,” Kris said. He pressed his lips against her neck and Jia tried to find the willpower to make him wait until they got back to his place.

But if they waited, she knew that the emotional connection would be gone. His heart would be closed off to her. And for all that Jia liked to have fun, she always wanted more than that, too. She wanted him when he wasn’t just using her body but when she could believe that it was really making love.

So she didn’t push him away.

 

* * *

 

Sohee finally cornered Lu Han on his spacious upstairs patio, drinking what looked like hard liquor and staring out at the sunset. It was all very dramatic, so she didn’t have any twinge of conscience about interrupting him.

“You’re avoiding me,” she said, sidling up beside him. “Every time I look at you, you run.”

Lu Han’s lips pressed into a frown. “I can’t tell you anything, Sohee.”

Sohee folded her arms around herself and sighed. Sometimes she had the feeling that her brother didn’t tell her anything _because_ she was more capable than he was, not in spite of it. Lu Han, though, had some other reason for not answering her questions. She remembered him at the launch party, halfway to a nervous breakdown: _This is so much bigger than us._ For that very reason, Sohee wanted to know, and she’d keep pushing until she did. Lu Han was the weak link, she was sure of it.

“You’d feel better if you talked about it,” she told him. She didn’t really mean anything particular, so she was shocked when Lu Han crumpled over into one of the plush chairs ornamenting the patio, set his glass aside, and buried his face in his hands.

Sohee perched herself on the arm of the chair and placed a hand on Lu Han’s shoulder. She knew people thought her cold and unfeeling, but that wasn’t really true. Maybe she’d pushed too far with Lu Han. She always thought him unbreakable in the way of the very elite, his moral sense so skewed he couldn’t be hurt by anything. She massaged her thumb gently against his shoulder, trying to figure out what she could say now. Her brother wouldn’t be of any use, and Lu Han looked like he might cry.

“Tell me something,” he said. He looked up at her with wide, oddly innocent eyes. “How many of these people would be here if my dad _wasn’t_ the Procurator-General?”

Sohee opened her mouth, but then she closed it again. It was too complicated a question to answer, and in truth there might be very few of them here. She wondered the same. It was part of why she never went to her brother’s parties—the illusion of friendship did nothing for her. It was all just smokescreens and they all went home to their big lonely mansions.

“Lu Han, you have to let me help you,” Sohee said. She meant it now. She wanted to get the information out of his head, but it hurt to see her brother’s best friend turning into a shell of his former self for reasons unknown.

He didn’t say anything, but he rested his head against her side and she listened to him struggle not to cry. What the hell was really going on? She carefully adjusted so she could put her arms around him, feeling inadequate to provide whatever maternal touch he needed. But she had to try, and maybe she could comfort him and get the truth all at once. Sohee was pragmatic. As she held him, she looked up to see Sehun standing in one of the open doorways from inside the house, watching them with a slight frown. Sohee stared at him for a long moment, and then looked away.

“Here’s the thing,” Lu Han said with a shaky breath. “If I do nothing, then everything stays the same. If I do the right thing, then we lose. But if everything stays the same, haven’t we kind of lost anyway?”

“You’re not making sense,” Sohee told him. He looked at her again, with those same fearful, doe-like eyes. Sohee was starting to become a different kind of worried. At the launch party, she thought maybe Lu Han had taken some kind of drug without realizing what it was. But even though he’d been drinking now, she didn’t think he was on anything else. She thought he was genuinely consumed with fear.

Lu Han opened his mouth, and Sohee didn’t dare breathe, in case he was going to tell her everything. She stayed very still and quiet, waiting for the answers to everything swirling terribly around them.

But then her brother appeared on the patio. He strode up to them and grabbed Lu Han, pulling him up by the arm. Lu Han leaned into him like a rag doll, his eyes glassy.

“Why don’t you trust me?” Minseok rounded on Sohee. “All I do is try to look out for you, and all you want to do is stir up shit. Leave it _alone!_ ” And with that, Minseok dragged Lu Han away.

Sohee fell into Lu Han’s vacated seat and laughed because she was too upset to do anything else. Her brother, her own blood, thought she was as useless as the rest of their family did. _Stay quiet, Sohee. Stay out of trouble. You’re so pretty, Sohee. A pretty girl like you doesn’t need to dirty her hands._

Sohee looked up. Chanyeol stood in front of her, his hands tucked into his pockets, a puzzled look on his face.

“I’m not in the mood, Chanyeol,” she said.

But he just shook his head. “No, it’s not that.” He blinked and looked around vaguely, then back at her, his gaze now steady. “I think I just connected a bunch of dots.”

Sohee sat up a little straighter. “What do you mean?”

“Well,” Chanyeol said, “If I’m right—then you should probably let your brother take the fall for this one like he wants to, Sohee.”

Sohee considered this for about a split second.

“Chanyeol,” she commanded, “tell me what you think you know.”

 

* * *

 

Most of the party-goers had cleared out of the room. Yixing hovered near Lu Han, who was standing in a corner eyeing the cleaning job that was being done on the carpet. He looked like he was about to collapse. Yixing was worried about his friend, but Lu Han wouldn’t talk. Wouldn’t even say a word about the amount of damage Kris and Baekhyun had done to the party and his house. It scared Yixing. Minseok had dragged him back in earlier when he’d gone out to “take a breather”. In reality all Lu Han had done was to drink some more and have some sort of convoluted conversation with Sohee that had pissed Minseok off very badly.

“I need more of this.” Lu Han muttered and shook his empty glass distractedly. “Those two fuckers. That was my mother’s favourite carpet.” Yixing frowned as Lu Han paused before letting out a low, unsteady laugh.

“What you need is to sit down and rest.” Minseok came up from behind them, sounding rather cross. Yixing nodded in agreement, and Lu Han let them take him to the patio outside. Everyone else was gathered near the pool, where the DJ had set up camp, and it was almost empty except for Kyungsoo, who immediately sprang up from his seat when he saw them approach.

“Sit down.” Minseok ordered, and Lu Han sprawled himself on the chair nearest to him. Kyungsoo was looking at them cautiously, and Yixing shook his head slightly. “Kyungsoo, go get him some water.”

When Kyungsoo had run off, Yixing settled himself on the seat beside Lu Han and watched concernedly as his friend stared in the distance. “What is going on?” Yixing placed a hand on his arm and Lu Han shook it off weakly. “Seriously, tell me. Tell us.”

“Nothing.” Lu Han mumbled and closed his eyes tiredly. Yixing exchanged a look with Minseok, who had an expression so frustrated Yixing half thought he wanted to reach forward and shake Lu Han awake violently. But Minseok was never prone to violence, so he merely sat down beside Yixing. “Like, there is nothing wrong with my world at all.”

Yixing felt something very much like anger rise up in him, and he leaned forward before he could help himself to tear the nicotine patch off his wrist. It came off with a loud tearing sound, and Lu Han squeezed his eyes together hard before opening them and glaring at him. Good, Yixing thought, at least he looked a little more alive now. Kyungsoo came back with a full glass of water just then, and he handed it over to Minseok, who shoved it into Lu Han’s hands. Some of it spilled onto his lap, and Lu Han let out a chuckle that disturbed Yixing more than it should have.

“How’s Kyungwon?” Lu Han asked in between giggles, and Kyungsoo fidgeted uncomfortably. “Is he still being the good kid who never fucks around because your grandmother says not to? I miss Kyungwon. Little fucker’s also good to laugh with. How’s Kyungwon? How is he?”

Kyungwon was the oldest son of the Do publishing family, and Yixing knew him because Minseok and Lu Han did. They were all in the same high school once, many years ago, and Kyungwon was the one that Lu Han copied off homework from whenever he forgot to do his work. But now he was based in Seoul, and Yixing hadn’t seen him in a long time. Lu Han looked devastated as he continued to ask about Kyungwon. Kyungsoo tried to answer, but Lu Han kept cutting him off. Yixing didn’t feel like Lu Han was in the state of mind to do anything right now, and so he tried to put a stop to it.

“Enough, Lu Han.” Yixing pulled on his arm, and Lu Han leaned backwards weakly in his chair, head lolling over the top. “What the hell are you doing?”

Lu Han didn’t answer and continued staring at the sky. Yixing closed his eyes momentarily and willed himself to have more patience. Minseok had set his face in a severe frown when he turned around to look at him, and stood up so quickly that his chair almost toppled over.

“I’m going to burn all of those nicotine patches. Know where he keeps them?” Minseok announced, and Yixing told him about the drawer in Lu Han’s night table. He nodded, and motioned for Kyungsoo to follow. Soon it was just the both of them, and the patio was eerily empty. Yixing could hear the bass beats from the sound system downstairs. Lu Han was still staring at the sky.

“Yixing,” he suddenly called and Yixing blinked, “have you ever felt like… the entire world is lying to you?”

Yixing glanced over at Lu Han’s side profile. He was sometimes almost unnaturally good looking, and Yixing knew that he had the world in his possession. Everything Lu Han wanted was a physical reality for him. Lu Han didn’t need to build any castles in the air, all he had to do was just say a word and it would be presented to him. Much like today, Yixing mused. Lu Han had this all written in his fortune before he was born. There was no reason to believe that it was a lie.

“I don’t really know.” Yixing said truthfully after a while. Lu Han turned his head round to look at him. “I don’t.”

“That feeling sucks.” Lu Han replied and lifted his legs onto the table in front of him. His voice was very quiet and Yixing could barely hear him when the DJ was playing so loudly in the background. “It fucking sucks.”

Yixing watched him for a moment. “Is this… about your family?” It was a wild guess, but Liyin wasn’t a liar. Her warning rung in his head again, about Lu Han’s family being the kind of people that he didn’t have the ability to ever offend, and Yixing felt dread trickle down his back. He didn’t want it to be true.

Lu Han’s gaze turned cold. He opened his mouth to say something and Yixing was ready to counter whatever it was if Lu Han would _just talk_ , but there were footsteps before Sehun appeared on the patio with a large bottle of vodka in hand. He looked even more drunk than Lu Han was, but he was at least walking in a relatively straight line.

“Hi.” Sehun hiccuped and sat down, setting the bottle on the table with a loud thump. Yixing saw Lu Han eye it with interest, and used his foot to push it out of his reach. “I was looking for you.”

“Yeah?” Lu Han had his eyes closed now. Yixing glanced at Sehun, who was smiling in a dreamy sort of way, and then back at Lu Han. They were both off their rockers. Yixing glared at Sehun but he didn’t seem to notice.

Sehun paused for an extended moment as the DJ cranked out another tune that sounded vaguely like Korean to Yixing. Lu Han had opened his eyes in the meantime, and was trying to edge the bottle of vodka closer to him using the tip of his loafers. Yixing simply reached over and swiped it off the table. Lu Han gave him a hard look and flipped him off.

“Isn’t Sohee hot?” Sehun began suddenly, and Yixing was suddenly very aware of the fact that they were extremely lucky Minseok had gone off a while ago. “Are you dating her? She’s so fucking hot.”

Lu Han looked much saner than he’d ever been in the last few minutes as he sat up straighter, quite clearly taken aback, before he started laughing. “Min—Minseok should be here.” He gasped while chuckling so hard Yixing could see the veins pop in his neck. “He’d fuck you up so bad.”

“You two looked _so_ cozy,” Sehun continued as Lu Han struggled to keep his breathing straight, “like man, what would I do to let her have her arm around me like that? Her fucking legs, god.”

Yixing found it funny for a while, before he realised that Lu Han wasn’t going to stop laughing. Sehun had gaped at him for a while before joining in, but soon the vodka had kicked in and he was now slouched over, not very conscious. Lu Han kept on laughing, even as Yixing stared at him. He could see the tears in his eyes. Lu Han didn’t wipe them off, and they streamed down his face as he buried his face into his knees, still chuckling.

“Lu Han.” Yixing reached for his shoulder hesitantly.

“It’s just s—so funny, isn’t it?” Lu Han wheezed, still unable to stop laughing. “We’re such a fucking funny bunch, aren’t we?”

Yixing watched as Lu Han shook with laughter, his frame suddenly unusually thin, and had the feeling that he was now telling him everything, but also nothing at all.

 

* * *

 

As soon as Kris finished buttoning up his shirt, Jia knew that any emotional intimacy she’d hoped for was gone. Already his eyes roamed the room for anything to look at besides her, and there was a cold distance between them that made it seem as though their absolute closeness minutes before was nothing but a daydream. Jia raked a hand back through her hair, and smoothed down her bangs. Sometimes she was such a stupid girl. She curled her arms around herself without meaning to and looked at the plush rug on the floor.

“We should get going,” Kris said. She glanced up at him. He smiled a little, and then opened the door of the office.

The thing about Kris was that he really wasn’t that bad to her, in the full scheme of guys she’d dated. He was kind, if a little selfish, but she didn’t think he deliberately wanted to hurt her—and she had dated a guy like _that_ once, who said cruel things just for the sadistic pleasure of watching her reaction. Really, Baekhyun insulting her background and her integrity didn’t come close to matching the cruelty of that boyfriend. She wised up and dumped him when she left to study in America, and in the intervening years she learned a lot about what she really wanted out of a relationship.

Kris, well—she wanted him to be the guy she suspected he _could_ be, rather than the one who kept showing up. Following him out the door, Jia wavered for a second between optimism and giving up. She picked the former, and reached out to hold onto his hand. He looked over at her, visibly surprised, and pulled his hand away so he could drape his arm around her shoulders as they walked down the hall. Close to him again, Jia tried to relax. She had nothing to worry about, really.

They wound their way through the vast house and down the large staircase that led to the entry hall. The party was still very much underway. Jia spotted Sehun passed out on one of the plush couches in the sitting room off the hall, and reflexively she slipped away from Kris and into the next room to prop Sehun on his side. Luckily, he seemed to be dozing, rather than truly unconscious. She wondered what kind of small fortune it would cost to get this couch cleaned of vomit. Out the window, she could see one of the well-groomed courtyards. A bunch of people she didn’t recognize stood around in a circle, dancing to the music reverberating from the pool area at the back of the house. They were all clearly drunk. Jia figured they were all children of the elite, avoiding their parents’ cutthroat world of competition and power in the oblivion of alcohol. The longer Jia stuck around these people, the more certain she was that she didn’t belong. Even Zitao turned out to be someone different than she thought he was.

She turned on her heel to go back into the entry hall, but it was empty again. She wandered back into the next room, scanning the faces of the numerous party guests, until she finally spotted Kris in the center of a tight circle. These people weren’t so drunk. Jia recognized the Jung sisters from the launch party, and Amber Liu, one of the more popular socialites based in Los Angeles, but everyone else was unknown to her. Kris was the one talking, and after a moment, the whole circle laughed. Jia stopped walking.

Truly, she worked hard to be affable and fun. She liked to put people at ease, to keep the atmosphere up, and to make people laugh. But looking at them, Jia realized that not everyone functioned the way she did. Kris molded himself to this environment, so they liked him, but Jia might never be able to make the kinds of alterations it would take to fit in here. As a freshman, she played the part of a wild party girl, and it was fun sometimes. But now, Jia couldn’t imagine drinking herself unconscious with anyone but Sehun and Zitao, and since she hadn’t been talking to them, she realized she didn’t miss it. And whatever was going on with Kris in that circle—she couldn’t go there. She didn’t, and would never, have the fortunes to make herself truly desirable. She would always be the fuck buddy Baekhyun had called her. Even the one time Kris really opened up about his past, it had only led to sex.

Jia shook herself. She was standing in the middle of a room, holding too many realizations in her head. And she was probably just paranoid, anyway.

She left the room, the laughter echoing in her ears. She could wait for Kris outside. As she walked, all of Baekhyun’s words started playing in her head again. Kris stood up for her, she reminded herself. She couldn’t write him off. He didn’t know how to be in a relationship, really.

At the front door, she stopped and looked into the sitting room where Sehun was passed out, just to double-check to see if he was alive. Someone else was in the room with him, bending over him to see if he was conscious. It was Yixing, concern written across his face.

“I think he’s just asleep,” Jia said, crossing the distance from front door to the sitting room. Yixing looked up, surprised.

Yixing straightened up. “Yeah, I think so,” he agreed. “Are you okay?”

Jia registered the exhausted, drawn look of his eyes, the defeated slump of his shoulders. So much was going on in this house. Somehow it seemed wrong to her that Yixing lived here.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” she said with a wave of her hand. “Don’t worry about me.”

“Baekhyun is an asshole.” Yixing’s face was so deadly serious, Jia couldn’t help but crack a smile.

“Hey, he made the party more interesting, right?” she joked. She wasn’t entirely sure why she was saying it, but for whatever reason, she didn’t want Yixing to think that those cruel words really affected her. “I mean, it was pretty boring before he got started. And anyway, a handmade present? What was I thinking?”

She grinned. Yixing didn’t even give a polite half-smile. Jia felt her own smile fade and she reached to twist at the bracelet around her wrist.

“Your gift was perfect,” Yixing said. “Lu Han already found his cat and put the collar on it. It looked much better than anything he could have bought.”

Jia chewed at her bottom lip for a second. “Did _you_ go put that collar on his cat?” She was already fairly sure of the answer. A pink tinge crossed Yixing’s cheeks, and he gestured vaguely in the direction of the back of the house.

“Lu Han is really…” He trailed off, gesturing wildly. “Anyway. He really liked it. He’s just sort of—I don’t know what’s going on with him right now.”

“It’s okay,” Jia said quickly. Lu Han did seem out of sorts, and it was a dumb gift, whether Yixing was willing to say so or not. She didn’t mind if it was forgotten about entirely, but it was sweet of Yixing to make sure that it wasn’t.

They looked at each other for a moment. Jia didn’t know what else to say. It seemed a shame to her that everyone Yixing knew, this whole world she’d found herself in the middle of, was bent on tearing each other apart. Intuitively she knew that Feifei was no different, that only Yixing had demonstrated himself to be different, even if it was only a little bit. If Jia decided to turn her back on all of these people—and she considered it more every passing second—she would be sorry to say goodbye to Yixing.

“Jia?”

She turned around. Kris stood at the front door, his car keys in one hand, the other on the door handle. He raised a hand to say goodbye to Yixing. Jia turned back around to see Yixing waving in reply. Sehun let out a loud snore on the couch behind them. Jia laughed a little at that.

“Thanks, Yixing,” she said, waving her own small goodbye. His expression looked pained, and he didn’t say anything in return, but he smiled a little.

Jia turned back and followed Kris out the door. It was a cool California night. The sky above them was bright with the city lights. Jia watched Kris’s back as he walked down the long path to his car, and she wondered to herself if she should keep trying to break through for his sake, or if it was a hopeless cause.

 

* * *

 

Feifei and Zhou Mi arrived at her home late in the evening, after leaving Lu Han’s birthday party to stop by the dinner party thrown by a business friend of Zhou Mi’s. That took up most of the rest of the night, and by eleven o’clock when Feifei was getting out of the car in her garage, the business day back in China was in full swing.

“You issued an apology from our second-level manager,” she said to the PR department head over the phone, barely managing to keep her anger in check. Zhou Mi turned off the car, watching her as she slammed the door behind her. “Why the fuck did you issue _anything_ without consulting me first?”

The PR department head rambled on and on about how damage control needed to be done quickly and the Byuns were threatening to pull out. Feifei rolled her eyes.

“Shut up,” she said. “You made this whole situation worse.” She followed Zhou Mi from the garage into the house.

“It’s not my fault your stepbrother decided to beat up one of the Byuns—” The PR head yelled into the phone.

“Yeah, but it’s going to be _your_ fault if the Byuns pull out because of your bullshit!” Feifei gave up on decorum and stood in her kitchen, glaring out the large windows at the yard beyond. She could picture them in the cigarette-smoke filled office in Shanghai, acting like they weren’t at fault.

“Look, I made a call, okay?” the PR head cried. “I’m not going to treat some fratboy brawl like a bigger issue than it is—”

“It is a fucking huge issue now, you’ve guaranteed that! It _was_ a fratboy brawl, but now it’s turning into some media disaster. They’re calling us _barbaric_ , do you realize this? I promise you will be sitting on the ruins of your career if you can’t fix this within the next hour. I will _not_ stand for this kind of screw up! You issue an official apology from _me_ , you make it as disgustingly apologetic as it needs to be, and you do _not_ for one second treat this like it isn’t a big deal because this could cost us the Byuns, and they will take half a dozen other investors with them, and by the time that happens my father will be raining down hell on _all_ of us!”

The PR head kept swearing under his breath, but his resolve was broken. Feifei opened her mouth to yell at him again, but then she noticed that Zhou Mi was standing very still in front of the entry way into the living room.

“Do your fucking job,” Feifei said into the phone, “Or lose it. I don’t care what you have to say to smooth this over, but you smooth it over.”

The PR head complained some more, but Feifei tuned him out as she walked up to Zhou Mi. He turned to look at her very slowly, and she faltered. His face was pale. He pointed toward the living room, and Feifei looked.

She let out a small scream.

“What the hell?” the PR manager demanded.

But Feifei couldn’t speak. She gaped at her couch, and what was on it.

“I’ll call you back in an hour,” she said finally, and hung up the phone.

On her couch lay a bloodied pig head, its eyes gouged out. Blood was smeared all over the light blue fabric, as though the head had been rolled across it before it landed in the center, where it stared up at her with its vacant eye sockets.

Zhou Mi cleared his throat. “There’s a letter, I think,” he said, his voice hollow.

Feifei crossed the room quickly and pulled the letter out from under the pig head, her hands shaking as she tore it open. Inside the envelope was one piece of paper, printed with Chinese characters. Her hands were shaking too badly to read it. Zhou Mi lay a hand on her shoulder, and she took a deep breath, finally steadying her hands.

_Wang Feifei:_

_Rome was not built in a day. Always think before you do anything._

_Keep pushing and you will not like what you find._

_This is a warning. Consider yourself indebted to us for not getting rid of you now._

Zhou Mi took the paper out of her hands and crumpled it up. Feifei went on staring at that pig’s head.

In China, a pig’s head symbolized a debt owed. This one told her that the debt she owed was, in the opinion of whoever sent this message, far greater than money or power. Inconvenient or troublesome people would be taken care of.

“What now?” Zhou Mi asked softly.

Feifei stared at the pig’s head. Her fear began to burn.

“Nothing changes,” she declared. “I won’t stop because of this.”


	9. 肅肅宵征

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Feifei learns who is behind her death threat, Sohee is forced to ask Sehun for help, Yixing tries to help his friends while their world keeps crumbling, Jia makes a decision, and Kris keeps trying to figure out what Feifei is hiding, while he also regrets sharing the details of his past with Jia.

 

肅肅宵征  
_Swiftly by night we go_

 

In the weeks following Lu Han’s party, it was like the seasons had shifted. Los Angeles remained sunny, but a deep chill set in among their circles. Yixing thought that some of it had to do with the fight, as people slowly and quietly divided their allegiances between Baekhyun, Kris, and Minseok. But something else was happening, too. It was that thing lurking under the water that he could sense but not see, coming up a little closer to the surface.

Lu Han stopped going to classes unless Yixing physically dragged him out of bed. Minseok was away on family business frequently. Yixing felt a little adrift himself, trying to prepare for whatever was coming without really knowing what to expect. He almost called his cousin to find out if everything was connected to what she told him when they got back from vacation, but knowing that Lu Han’s family was dirty, and saying that that was the direct cause of whatever was happening now, were two different things. Yixing didn’t want to make that jump if he didn’t have to, because then he might have to choose sides, too. And Lu Han needed him.

He started parking in a different parking lot when he went to classes because he needed the change of pace to keep him feeling normal, and because he was closer to Lu Han’s classes that way and could drive them both in. And because Meng Jia parked in that lot. It wasn’t anything. She just looked sad, a lot, and whatever was happening to the rest of them was surely affecting her, too.

He pulled into a spot one morning, two rows behind Jia’s car, and reached around to the backseat for his book bag. Lu Han was like a ghost, his hands shaking for a cigarette. Yixing wanted to make him go to a counselor but Lu Han always refused, insisting that no one could help him, that it was all up to him.

So Yixing was surprised when Lu Han actually spoke up that morning.

“You’re running down a dead-end road,” he said. Yixing looked up and Lu Han pointed to Jia getting out of her car. “You’re just going to fuck yourself up.” Lu Han spoke like his former self, but he sounded hollow. Even so, Yixing could see genuine concern in his eyes.

“It’s nothing,” Yixing said. “We’re friends.”

Lu Han didn’t say anything and Yixing started to get out of the car. Maybe he was playing dumb, but if he didn’t acknowledge something then it wasn’t real—like he didn’t acknowledge whatever Lu Han was dealing with so that he could take care of him. And he and Meng Jia were just friends, and he wanted to be her friend.

“Yixing,” Lu Han said very seriously, with enough bite to his tone that Yixing actually stopped and looked at him. “Don’t do it.”

Yixing knew Lu Han was looking out for him. But he also knew to trust his own intuition. Show up where he was needed and do the right thing. His parents raised him to act with integrity. Yixing had to try.

“Go to class,” he said. Lu Han, looking defeated, shrugged his shoulders, got out of the car, and wandered toward his class building.

Yixing looked back to Jia’s car. She leaned against it, like she was waiting for him, her hands in the pockets of her jacket and her eyes hidden behind aviators. Yixing slung his bag over his shoulder, took a deep breath, and headed toward her.

“Everything okay?” she asked when he reached her. He shrugged, turning around to look at Lu Han’s now-small figure. At least he was still headed toward the right building.

“Not really,” Yixing answered honestly.

She didn’t say anything for a moment and they stood there in the parking lot, a cool breeze blowing past them.

“Do you want to ditch class?” she asked suddenly. “I don’t want to go. Honestly, the only reason I even came here was to see if you wanted to ditch with me. I don’t want to be alone.”

Yixing looked back over his shoulder. “I just forced Lu Han to go to class,” he said. He couldn’t see Lu Han anymore, and hoped he’d really followed through. “Seems a little hypocritical.”

“I won’t tell,” Jia said, and smiled a little. It was the first real smile he’d seen from her in a while.

“Okay,” he agreed. Her smile grew, and he figured he’d made the right choice.

They walked to a nearby park, not speaking much except for a little small talk about each other’s weeks, and then they sat down on a bench across from a playground. There were a few parents there with young kids who weren’t in school yet. Yixing watched a father help his daughter toddle her way up to a slide, and then he held her as she slid down. Something about their happiness seemed so distant to him, it made his heart ache. No one could regress to childhood but he’d like to go back for just a day or two, just to capture those memories and bring them forward to now.

He looked over and saw that Jia was watching them, too. “My dad was like that,” she said. “A little more stern, maybe. He put me in gymnastics when I was four, just because he thought I could succeed.”

“Did you?” Yixing asked.

She smiled. “Well, unlike Zitao, I’m not killing myself to get to the Olympics. So it really depends on how you look at it, I guess.”

She fell quiet after that. Yixing didn’t want to interrupt her thoughts, so he just watched the families. A kid dropped his popsicle and sat down on the ground, crying, until the family dog came up and started licking his face. Yixing chuckled. They all seemed so far removed from his life, but it was good to see that the world went on spinning even when his started coming apart at the seams.

“You might not want to talk about this,” Jia said. Yixing looked over and found her suddenly very serious. “But I don’t really have anyone else to talk to about it.”

Yixing knew intuitively that she wanted to talk about Kris. She hadn’t, thus far, and he’d been relieved. He didn’t think he could lie to her. If she asked what Kris said about her he’d end up telling her the truth. Kris was nowhere near Baekhyun and the horrible things he’d said about her at the party, but Kris never sounded like he was in love with her, either. Yixing didn’t want to see her face if he told her that.

“Do you know who Kris’s father is?” she asked.

Yixing hadn’t been expecting that. He thought about it for a few seconds, but came up with nothing. The circles of the elite might be small, but China was still a vast country. It was impossible to keep track of the histories of every person who managed to make it rich. He shook his head.

“Then I probably shouldn’t talk about it.” She sighed and pressed her fingers against her forehead. “Kris—you know, he has a lot of pain. And it’s all stuffed way down inside where it just eats away at him. It’s like it’s eroding away every good part of him and he doesn’t know how to make it stop.”

Yixing held his silence. Jia needed to talk through this, not hear whatever he might have to say. She might be right about Kris, but Yixing had no way of knowing that. Kris mostly kept to himself, kept his cards hidden and played a good game. Whoever he was behind closed doors was, if Yixing thought about it, a mystery.

“I don’t know. It’s like, we had this one moment where I really thought he was opening up to me and then—there was just nothing. It’s like he realized he showed me too much and now he’s putting up all these walls.”

She covered her face with her hands and Yixing placed his hand between her shoulder blades, careful that his gesture couldn’t be misinterpreted. She didn’t seem to be crying, though. A moment later she pulled her hands away and looked at him. She wasn’t crying but the feeling was there.

“I think,” she said, “That I always think I can save guys like that. They come to me all broken and I go to bed with them and listen to them spill their hearts out but in the end it’s me who gets hurt. I should learn my lesson.” She laughed a little. “Should have learned it when I was fourteen years old, and fifteen, and seventeen, and twenty, and now. I have the worst fucking type.” She laughed again and this time a single tear fell down her cheek, but she wiped it away quickly. “Sorry. You don’t want to hear all this.”

Yixing fumbled around for the right words. “No—I really don’t mind. I just,” he faltered a little, “I don’t want to sit here and talk shit about Kris. But I don’t really have any good things to contribute. I don’t know the guy.”

Jia laughed. “You’re so odd, you know it?”

He watched another tear roll down her cheek, and then another. From what he could tell she had no intention of breaking up with Kris and he didn’t want to ask and hear that he was correct. She kept wiping away the tears until finally she gave up and buried her face in her hands.

Yixing’s instinct was to wrap his arms around her and hold on very tight. But he shouldn’t. That could be misconstrued as a guy taking advantage of an emotionally vulnerable girl and the _last_ thing he wanted her to think was that he was only listening to her because he thought she’d have sex with him if he did. That was was the furthest thing from his mind. She was his friend and she needed someone to support her. He didn’t know if he should hold her though. That was blurring a lot of lines, at least in his mind.

But he couldn’t just sit there and watch while she cried. So very gingerly, Yixing moved closer to her, and wrapped one arm around her shoulders. She turned toward him automatically. His next instinct, this one more fierce, was to press a kiss into her hair and hold her very close until she stopped crying. He shut that thought down immediately.

“I’m the worst, aren’t I?” she laughed, blinking up at him through her tears. “Making you sit here and listen to me complain about another guy, and then I start _crying_. Zitao and Sehun would be freaking out right now.”

“Zitao and Sehun need to grow up,” Yixing said. He winced. “Sorry. Trying not to insult anyone you like.”

“No, they do need to grow up,” she laughed.

He realized then that he had started rubbing small circles on her back, just without thinking, and that they were still sitting very close. Jia didn’t seem bothered at all, but then, Jia didn’t have feelings for him, so of course it wouldn’t bother her.

An odd look crossed her face. “We should head back,” she said. She stood up and Yixing felt a rush of relief at the distance between them again.

Yixing stood up and slung his backpack over his shoulder. He reached for Jia’s bag, as well, remembering his mother’s instructions to be a gentleman. “Do you want to get something to eat?” he asked.

She shook her head. “No, I’m going to go home,” she said. “There’s something I’ve been avoiding for a few days and I should deal with it now. I think I can actually deal with it now, anyway, thanks to you. You’re a good friend to me.”

Yixing shook his head. “Nah. This is the bare minimum of what a friend should be.”

Jia laughed, and Yixing tried not to let his heart swell while he looked at her. He managed to stuff the feeling down, but barely. They walked back, chatting aimlessly, while he repeated _just friends_ to himself at odd moments. As a reminder.

 

* * *

 

Feifei arrived at the five star restaurant fifteen minutes before noon. The luncheon, held to celebrate the partnership between one of China’s largest manufacturing corporations and its counterpart in the U.S., did not impress Feifei in the least. Before Syopin Online's launch, she was merely a pretty stand-in for her father or whatever useless lump he had running things in the U.S. at the time. Although she enjoyed the new recognition of her power, Feifei hated parties more with each one she attended.

Zhou Mi was away on business—that is, buying up a house and large vineyard in Northern California “so we have a place to live if things turn apocalyptic,” his favorite way of phrasing things after the incident with the pig head—so Feifei attended the luncheon alone. The place reeked of wealth and power. She counted no less than eight of her father’s counterparts, visiting from China just for this deal.

She circled round the tables until she found her own name card on one near the front. She looked at the name cards at the empty place settings on either side of hers. To her left was someone with the surname Liang; after turning the name over in her head for a moment Feifei realized he was the CEO of a large gelatin company. To her right, the name card read Song Qian.

Feifei frowned at the characters and the cursive slant of the romanization. Song Qian, or Victoria as she was called by most people Feifei knew, was a frightening businessperson in her own right, with her profile raised even higher after her engagement to a young politician favored by Beijing. Feifei didn’t know her well, although she was one of Zhou Mi’s closest friends, like a sister since childhood. There was also the unfortunate situation that while Feifei’s father had used the Songs to finance the original online shopping venture in China, the Wangs’ international ventures had turned to other investors, primarily the Ahns, whose reach overseas exceeded the exorbitant domestic wealth enjoyed by the Songs. Feifei did not want to burn any bridges, but it would be a long luncheon if Victoria held any resentment.

She needed a drink. Shouldering her purse again, Feifei left the table for the bar on the other end of the venue, where a cluster of men in suits stood around laughing. One of them noticed her and beckoned her over.

“Wang Feifei,” he said, beaming, “Last time I saw you, you were only this tall.” He placed his hand at about half of Feifei’s current height. She recognized him as a politician, known for bringing big business into his province. She smiled pleasantly. Undoubtedly he had been paying off the procurator-general for over a decade, too.

Eventually the group got tired of reminiscing about business in the 90’s and Feifei was left alone at the bar. She ordered her drink and looked up at the television playing silently on the wall. It was tuned to a station focused on Chinese news, probably at the request of one of the men who had just left. The president of China was giving a speech. According to the captions scrolling across the bottom, it had to do with China’s international presence. Feifei looked at the faces of the people chosen to stand behind the president, in view of the television cameras. The youngest she saw was Han Geng. Last time Zhou Mi mentioned his old friend, Han Geng was still a low-level politician using his father’s good name and their vast wealth to raise his profile. Seemed he’d had a promotion.

“It suits him, doesn’t it?”

Feifei turned. Victoria had come up beside her, her eyes turned up to the television, broad smile on her face. Her floaty yellow dress contrasted sharply with Feifei’s own sleek black one. Zhou Mi said that the advantage Victoria had over Feifei was that Victoria was better at playing to people’s imaginations. She soothed people into submission, he said, while Feifei held a gun to their head. Feifei’s reply had been, “They’re both effective though, aren’t they?”

Feifei smiled. “Congratulations on your engagement.”

Victoria’s eyes shifted from the screen. Her smile didn’t change. “You know, my father said it was dangerous to marry a politician. Said the only good that would come from it was that when I got murdered, the government would bury the story instead of it getting printed up in every tabloid. But he didn’t seem to mind much after the Party called Geng the next generation of China’s leadership.”

Feifei glanced back at the screen again. Han Geng was on the rise, then. Hand-picked to carry China forward. This made his and Victoria’s marriage a dangerous union.

“Fathers are difficult,” Feifei said.

Victoria’s eyebrow arched in amusement. “Speaking from experience?” she asked, her tone teasing.

“I wouldn’t dare,” Feifei said with a small smile, and took a sip of her drink.

Victoria laughed lightly, a sound Feifei suspected was cultivated specifically to be pleasant, while still distant. The television program cut to another wide shot, and Han Geng’s face was visible again.

“You and Zhou Mi will be invited to the wedding, of course,” Victoria said. “It will be in Qingdao this fall. Geng mentioned you recently. He’s very eager to meet the woman Zhou Mi would happily marry.”

Feifei caught the implications and smiled. “I’m afraid I won’t live up to the expectations.”

“Oh, but you do,” Victoria said.

She leaned against the bar and her stare was so intense that Feifei felt a strange, prickling sensation crawl down her back. It took her a moment to recognize that she was intimidated.

Victoria smiled and continued. “You’re the next generation as much as Geng is, you know. We all are set to inherit this incredible, messy, incomprehensible country. Look around us.” She gestured to the other people at the luncheon, the men in business suits chortling at the tables, the self-assured power in the room. “Do you think this will last? It can’t. It’s the nature of life that eventually, one generation dies and it’s up to the next to determine what sort of world they want to pass onto their children. I intend to leave my children with a much better country than the one I’ve been handed.”

Feifei didn’t say anything. Victoria was hinting at something, but Feifei couldn’t yet discern what that was. At the very least, she was starting to doubt that smile, and doubt the pretty words Victoria had just spoken. It sounded too much like propaganda to be trusted.

“Do you travel much?” Victoria asked.

Feifei made an _mmm_ of assent, glancing back up at the television screen as she turned to face the bar again. Han Geng clapped silently as the president stepped down from the podium.

“Me too,” Victoria said. “I was in Italy recently, visiting some friends. Have you been to Italy?”

“Once,” Feifei said. She turned to face Victoria, sensing that something important was about to be said. It was as though the temperature had dropped a few degrees, like her bright yellow dress was absorbing all the warmth of the room. Victoria was still smiling.

“It’s a lovely country, isn’t it? We traveled for several days—Venice, Milan, Rome. Truly incredible.”

Feifei gave a very small smile, wondering how she could extract herself from this conversation. But by her hypnotizing stare and her smile, Victoria made it impossible for Feifei to leave until she’d finished whatever she had to stay.

“I remember standing in Rome and thinking, at one point this little country owned half the world. They didn’t have China, of course—but their roads stretched all across the continent and into the next. They were unstoppable. But it all came crashing down. And I thought, how many little decisions had to be made for this to fall apart? How many people had to stop believing in the Empire for it to end? This is, of course, why I like to read history books. You learn a lot about people.”

Feifei watched as Victoria’s smile slid into a small smirk, still almost pleasant and virtually unreadable. She should say something, but there was nothing she could say. She could only wait for Victoria to finish.

“What I learned was that people are very selfish. Most people can’t see the big picture. It takes big picture thinkers—people like Han Geng, and me, and _you_ , Wang Feifei—to make something great out of all those selfish decisions people make every day. If we start acting selfish, the empire falls apart around us, doesn’t it? But if we can see the big picture, we will stand at the center of the world. One decision at a time, you know. After all, Rome wasn’t built in a day.”

Victoria smiled again, her words chilling the air between them, and then she strode away from the bar.

Feifei stayed frozen in place, staring vacantly at the drink in her hand, while Han Geng waved to the crowd on the television above her.

 

* * *

 

Feifei nearly crashed her car several times as she drove back from the luncheon to her office. The rest of the luncheon had been spent sitting next to Victoria, laughing politely while pondering just how much she knew, just how serious the death threat had been, just how close Feifei had come to cutting into the beating heart of China’s corruption. Victoria was, of course, correct: they were the next generation of China’s leadership. An empire thriving on its own decay was still an empire, after all, and Feifei saw how Victoria and Han Geng would move to make sure they protected their inheritance. But as Feifei saw it, cancer was cured by only the most ruthless of methods. Bribery wasn’t a cute game their parents played, but a deliberate flouting of the law.

When she was a small child, her grandfather—her maternal grandfather—took her on a visit to one of his many factories. Even now Feifei could hear the clamor of the machines running, smell the heavy odor of the chemicals used in the dyes, see the exhausted look in the eyes of the employees. And her grandfather’s business practices were, by all accounts, humane and fair. She knew China to be complex and vast, great integrity found living next door to total depravity. The corruption of the procurator-general was a flouting of _justice_ , a promise that no rule was too strict to be changed for the right price.

But for the right price, Feifei might end up dead, with a fake suicide note and no investigation to speak of.

She walked briskly to her office, watching as eyes appeared over their cubicle walls, saw her, and then disappeared again. Frustrated, she pulled out the key to her office and jammed the key into the lock, turning it several times before the door finally sprang open. She needed to clear her mind. Slumping into the large leather chair behind the impressive desk her father had ordered custom-made for her, Feifei closed her eyes. Inhale. Exhale.

“We need to talk.”

Her eyes snapped open. Kris stood in the doorway of her office, one arm propped up against the doorjamb. She frowned, and closed her eyes again.

“It can wait,” she told him.

But she heard the door latch shut and knew that it wasn’t because he’d had the good sense to let her be. She opened her eyes and took a good look at his overly tall frame.

“What?” she spat.

He came and sat on the edge of her desk, right next to her, folding his arms across his chest and watching her with a smarmy smile. They weren’t close enough to be touching, but almost, something he’d probably done on purpose.

“Tell me something,” he said. “You have this,” he gestured in the air wildly, “plan, I guess, to sabotage the biggest new venture this company has taken in the last five years. Then suddenly, your idiot stepbrother,” he pointed to himself, “drops the perfect opportunity in your lap, and socks Byun Baekhyun right in the face. The guy has a broken nose. The company is threatening to pull out and take everyone else with them. Our PR department screws up majorly, and gives an apology so lame it might as well be an insult.”

His eyes were very bright. This day was full of too much intrigue, Feifei was certain. Too many people stuck in a sick competition. Of course Kris wanted to come take his part in it.

“But you,” Kris continued, “You don’t take this opportunity. Instead you smooth everything over. So tell me, what happened? Why the hell would you help out your stepbrother? Because things don’t add up here.”

Feifei closed her eyes again. He was right, of course. From his perspective, things did not add up. But she couldn’t very well tell him that she had to maintain the appearance of everything going swimmingly until she had enough solid, indisputable evidence to destroy her father. She needed a lie that Kris would believe, because by now he had figured out that she already lied to him once, and new lies weren’t going to convince him. But she was so tired. Who was she, when Han Geng and Victoria sat in the palm of the Party’s hand, whispering into the ear of the Politburo? Who was Kris, in the face of that?

“What do _you_ think is going on, Kris?” she asked without opening her eyes.

“I’m not the one telling lies.”

Feifei opened her eyes. He was smiling. She was so sick of everyone hiding behind sweet smiles, watching each other for a hint of weakness before they pounced.

“Fine,” she said, her voice monotone. “The truth is, I’m in love with you. The moment I saw you break Byun Baekhyun’s nose, I knew I couldn’t do a thing to harm this company that will provide for both of us in the future, anomalies in the account or no. And they were tarnishing your reputation. How could I let them do that to the man I love? So I cleaned up the mess.”

As she spoke, his smile faded until it finally transformed into a scowl. She kept her own expression neutral, but inside she was pleased. Kris’s emotions ran close to the surface for anyone who knew what they were looking for.

“You think you’re funny,” he snarled.

She chuckled. “I’m hilarious. I’m going down for my first stand-up comedy show tonight. Hope you’ll be in the audience.”

His scowl grew deeper. He was about to unleash his retort when the door opened, and they both looked up. Jia stood there, looking between them innocently. “Um, Kris?” she asked. “Can I talk to you really quick?”

But Kris looked at his watch, his eyes widened, and he shook his head. “Sorry, Jia, I’ve got to be downstairs for a meeting right now.” He stood up and smoothed his dress shirt.

“Thanks for stopping by, didi,” Feifei said. He scowled at her, and left the room. Jia still hovered in the doorway, turning as he left to watch him head down the hall. She seemed out of sorts, not quite aware of her surroundings.

“Jia?” Feifei asked. “Is everything okay?”

Jia shook herself and turned back around. “Oh—yeah, fine. I just need to talk to Kris.”

Clearly, this wasn’t the whole story. Feifei stood up and crossed the room, putting her hand on Jia’s shoulder, trying to draw on a well of dried-up maternal instinct. Something was wrong. Jia’s bold, sunny personality had faded, and her insecurity was apparent in her posture, in the way she wrapped her arms around her middle and in the way she dressed today in muted colors. Feifei tried to count back to the last time she and Jia had actually spent any time together, and couldn’t think of it.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

Slowly, Jia pulled her shoulders back and lifted her chin up, rearranging herself into the facsimile of confidence. Feifei moved her thumb back and forth against Jia’s shoulder, waiting to hear what she had to say and half-hoping she was planning to dump Kris’s sorry flat ass.

Jia opened her mouth, her eyes full of some kind of secret. She looked into the office beyond them, and dropped her voice low.

“I—” she said, “I—I think I should quit.”

Feifei’s brow furrowed. “Why?” she asked, rolling through possible explanations in her head.

“I’m really sorry, I really am,” Jia said quickly, reaching up to peel Feifei’s hand from her shoulder and holding it in her own, “I know you got me this job and it will look bad if I quit, but—” She heaved a sigh, her hand tightening around Feifei’s. “I’m never going to fit in here.”

Feifei didn’t know what to say. Jia looked so sorrowful and resolved that she didn’t know if there was anything she _could_ say.

“You’re doing a fantastic job, Jia,” she said with as much force as she could muster. “Your manager came in last week and told me how glad he was to have you on the team. Is this about Kris?”

Jia wrapped her arms around herself again, but otherwise maintained her determined, confident poise. “It’s—sort of, it is, but—” She sighed again, looking back at Feifei with her eyebrows creased together. “I don’t just mean fit into this company. And I don’t just mean fit in with your friends, although it’s pretty clear that they’ll never accept me. But—Feifei, I want to go _home_.”

Jia smiled weakly and tucked her hair back behind her ear. Feifei mentally berated herself for not taking more time to make sure that Jia was acclimating well. She should have forced Jia and Kris apart back at the beginning, before Jia got it in her head that she couldn’t belong here. It was all Kris’s fault, that much was clear.

“You know my parents own some restaurants,” Jia said, her eyes suddenly warm and her smile genuine. “They’ve been doing pretty well, and I think it would be really good if I go back and work for them, do some ad campaigns for them. I know it’s nothing like what you all do here, but—I just want to be home.”

Feifei couldn’t dispute that. Although “home” was a complicated, unpleasant idea for her, she appreciated what it meant for Jia, who loved both her parents and whose parents loved her. Still, the idea of Jia leaving made Feifei sharply aware that her life was starting to crumble away, and every time she tried to stop up the leaks, another one sprang up.

“This is all Kris’s fault,” she muttered.

As soon as she said it, she wished she hadn’t, and she looked back at Jia, prepared to apologize. Jia’s expression stopped her. She seemed close to tears, but not quite.

“You know,” Jia said, her voice very soft. “Kris doesn’t show it, but—he has a lot of pain. A lot of pain. And he just buries it away.” She tilted her head to the side, as though realizing something for the first time. “So do you, actually. All of you do. You all have so much pain and you stuff it down somewhere dark and deep and then you spend all your time competing, and—and trying to hurt other people before they get the chance to hurt you. I can’t live this way. I can’t.”

Feifei took a shallow breath. Whatever Kris’s pain was, he and his mother had inflicted more pain on Feifei. Jia was too naive, too willing to look for the good in people who had none.

But somewhere in a very small part of her mind was the piercing fear that everything Jia said was true.

“Don’t quit yet,” Feifei said. She wanted to brush past what Jia had said but her voice sounded like a little girl’s. She couldn’t lose her best friend, not yet. “Just—just wait a little while longer, okay? For me?”

Jia watched her for a moment, then stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Feifei’s shoulders. “It’s going to be okay,” she said. “Don’t worry.”

Feifei didn’t believe her. But she smiled when Jia took a step back, and then left the office. She wanted to believe her. But Feifei had a mission, and when she was through with it, it was unlikely that anything would be okay.

 

* * *

 

Sohee pulled her key out and jabbed it into the keyhole again. It didn’t start, again, when she turned it a couple of times. She tried again. Still no luck. Sohee pulled her sunglasses off and began seriously considering the fact that she was stuck a good few miles away from a gated community of condominiums with a broken car. She was also supposed to catch Chanyeol by surprise so that he could give her more information, so calling anyone was a no-go. Sohee stepped outside and surveyed her white BMW convertible before kicking it in the hood. Now her foot hurt and it still didn’t start.

“Just. My. Fucking. Luck.” She hit it just so she could have something to do, but Sohee felt oddly empty inside after she was done. She ran a hand through her hair and exhaled slowly. She didn’t know why she was so insistent on finding out the answers. It couldn’t just be chalked up to her personality alone, but seeing Minseok so persistently denying her the truth made her even more determined to get down to the bottom of things. And, Sohee’s eyes darkened, Lu Han was also weighing down on her. She’d never seen him that way before, like he was so fragile she could break him. Sohee, the useless Ahn, had the ability to break him. It creeped her out.

A car horn sounded behind her and Sohee almost jumped before she collected herself quickly. It was an orange Lamborghini, and she recognised the person who stuck his head out and grinned at her almost immediately. She hadn’t seen Oh Sehun since Lu Han’s party, which was a good few weeks ago. Now he’d exited his car and strolled over to where she was.

“Uh, don’t think you’ll hitchhike successfully here. Not a thing we do.” Sehun stuffed his hands into his pockets and Sohee narrowed her eyes up him. She wasn’t as irritated as she had thought she would be. Maybe it had to do with the way he’d reacted during the party, when Baekhyun had behaved like a boor and insulted Kris’s girlfriend. Sohee hadn’t expected Sehun to be the first one to jump to Jia’s defense, but he did. It impressed her somewhat, no matter how grudgingly she was to admit it, that Sehun wasn’t all he seemed to be on the surface.

“I have a car.” She pointed to the BMW. He cocked an eyebrow.

“And you’re not driving it because?” He asked and she pointed downwards at the hood. “Ah, you knocked it out.”

“I did _not_ knock it out.” Sohee protested but Sehun had already gotten his hands on the hood. “It broke down on its own!”

Sehun fiddled around with the catch, before heaving it up. “Sure, that’s what they all say.” Sohee scowled at him, but he was already tinkering around with the engine. He looked like he knew what he was doing, so Sohee let him while she watched at the side. He stretched to reach for something and she realised how long his body proportions were. Weird. She’d never noticed that he was this tall before.

He frowned at something before he turned to her. “Overheating. This is not a car to be speeding in.” Sohee pursed her lips at him and he continued. “If you want, I can loan you the Lamborghini. Now _that’s_ something.”

She rolled her eyes and watched as he pushed the hood back down and pulled his phone out to call the tow truck. At least this would be under his name, and she wouldn’t lose the element of surprise when she knocked on Chanyeol’s door. “They’ll come in thirty minutes.” He said to her after he was done, and quirked an eyebrow at her. She gave him an odd look. “So if you want, you could come over and have a seat?”

“I’m staying right here.” She gave him a relatively false smile. Oh Sehun trying to pull the moves on her was kind of funny and transparent at the same time. “I want to see that my car’s actually being towed away.”

Sehun’s smile drooped a little, but he seemed to take it in stride. “Fine, then we’ll stay.” She noted his use of the plural, but merely put her Chloé crossbody down on the hood of the car and leaned back. He took up the space beside her, and she surprisingly felt comfortable enough that she didn’t ask him to back off. Whatever had happened to that Ahn Sohee who had smacked him down a few weeks ago? Sohee grimaced at her knees and didn’t want to know.

They waited in silence as the sun continued beating down on them. Sohee was sweating even in her light summer dress, and raised a hand to fan herself. The clouds were gathering in the distance, but the tow truck was still nowhere in sight. Beside her Sehun had closed his eyes. Maybe he was asleep. Sohee wondered if she could slip back into her car, but the lack of air conditioning deterred her. Then suddenly, she felt a splat of water on her face. One turned into two, and before she knew it Sehun had taken ahold of her hand, running with her all the way back to his Lamborghini. He helped her in first, before running over to the driver’s side. When he’d slipped inside Sohee could see that his entire white shirt was soaked. She looked away.

“Thanks.” She said as he pulled his letterman jacket off. If she focused on the brand maybe she would stop wanting to look at his chest. “That was sudden.”

“Well, at least you are having a seat now.” He grinned and Sohee exhaled very slowly. But she didn’t feel bad about the situation, so she ran a hand through her hair and tried to relax. Her hair was too damp for her liking, though, and she looked through her bag for a tissue. Before she had found any, Sehun had already passed her a box that he’d somehow managed to magick out of nowhere. Normally people didn’t keep tissue boxes in Lamborghinis, but Sohee took it without a word and started dabbing away at her hair.

The car was quiet enough that she could hear the rain pounding hard outside. Sohee peered out of the window for the tow truck, but all she could see was her white BMW alone and sad in the pouring rain. Sehun had turned the heating on, and she was acutely aware that his shirt was still very wet. So she tried to guess where it was from, and concluded that it was probably Tom Ford. Sohee realised, after an extended moment, that she had momentarily forgotten about her mission to press Chanyeol for more details. Being around Sehun made her focused on other things that she really shouldn’t be.

“I can’t believe that I’m—” Sehun suddenly shook his head and laughed, and Sohee gave him an odd look. He turned around to glance at her, and then shook his head again. “Never mind. I don’t want Minseok hyung to physically hurt me.”

“You are so weird.” She said before she realised what she was doing. Sehun actually looked amused by it, so Sohee decided to plough on. He really was weird. She’d gone from loathing him to sitting in his car to avoid the rain in the span of three weeks. All it had taken was him standing up to Baekhyun. “I don’t get you at all.”

“Uh, you’re not the first one to say that.” He propped his elbow on the steering wheel and faced her. “But I like it.”

“Do you say this to all the girls you pick up in your car?” She questioned.

“Nope.” He answered without thinking and smiled at her again. This time Sohee’s heart actually skipped a beat. Shit. “Usually they ride in Zitao’s.”

Sohee frowned and picked at the edge of her dress. “Whatever. Guess that gentlemanly behaviour to Meng Jia was an one-off thing.”

Sehun’s expression shifted slightly, and he was looking at her a little more intensely now. Sohee continued picking at her dress. He was tapping his fingers on the steering wheel when she finally looked up, and gave her a little raise of the eyebrows. Even she had to admit that it was insanely attractive. Now she knew why all the girls in her year at high school wanted to get with him and not Chanyeol.

“Jia’s my friend. Defending her seemed like the right thing to do.” He finally said and shrugged. But Sohee could tell that he wasn’t as casual as he wanted to be. It did seem like he considered Jia a friend of the real kind, that was important enough that he would stand up to Baekhyun, who could cause him endless trouble because he was a person to do just that. Sohee held his gaze, and he pressed his lips together and shrugged again. “Besides, Baekhyun hyung was being a dick.”

“Who at that party wasn’t?” Sohee said quietly and they sat together in silent agreement for a few moments. Sehun was looking at her in that intent manner again, and Sohee shifted slightly in her seat. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it was very intense. She tried to remember the brand of his jacket again but realised that she didn’t care anymore. Ahn Sohee not caring about fashion? Well, shit.

“Zitao. And me.” He said suddenly, and snapped his fingers. Sohee fought back a smile but could feel it creeping up anyway. He saw it too, because he was beaming even more widely and she liked the way his eyes was creasing into little crescents (shit, Sohee thought, shit). “Oh, and your brother too. Minseok hyung’s great.” He added on hastily like it was not an afterthought. Sohee commanded herself not to find that cute.

“I’ll be sure to tell him.” She muttered. “He’d be _so_ happy to hear that.”

“I don’t think you should,” he said and she glared at him until he raised his hands in surrender, “what I’m trying to say is, I don’t think he appreciates anybody’s compliments but yours too much.”

“Bullshit.” Sohee scoffed. “If he did, I wouldn’t be here looking for Chanyeol.”

Sehun’s expression had taken on a stiff sort of quality after she’d said that, but Sohee ignored it. It was true—if her brother had really any iota of faith in her, he would have told her everything that she wanted and needed to know. Nothing was going to stay the same now, that much she understood, but Sohee was frustrated by the fact that Minseok felt the need to take the same route as their parents did when it came to her. She didn’t need any protection. Sohee wanted to be the one doing the protecting.

“Why are you looking for Chanyeol hyung?” He asked and she thought about it. Maybe he could give her answers, but Chanyeol had also become strangely evasive after the party. Minseok had probably already gotten to him before she had the chance to ask for more. Sohee hated it when Minseok was always this fast on the uptake. What she had in spades, though, was perseverance, but clearly her car did not. That was why she was sitting in Sehun’s Lamborghini without answers and with damp hair.

“Because I can’t think of anyone else to help me.” She admitted, and curled her hands into fists. “Because my brother won’t tell me what the hell is going on, and I know it has something to do with all those shit people at Lu Han’s party, and I also know that our family is somewhat involved. I don’t want to just sit by and let my brother and dad deal with everything, you know? I don’t want to be like a dumb, good girl who doesn’t act on her intuition even when she knows it’s right. I don’t want to end up being regretful that I did nothing to help my family when they needed me the most.”

Somehow she had ended up spilling her guts to Sehun there and then. Sohee buried her face in her hands and tried to take slow, deep breaths. It was ridiculous, really, how she couldn’t tell Minseok this but had managed to go full verbal vomit on Sehun. But he didn’t say anything for a long time, and Sohee wanted to burrow through the car’s bottom and into the ground. It seemed all too hopeless now. Even if she did get to Chanyeol, he wouldn’t tell her anything either. Minseok’s sway over the younger kids was too great. She had seen it for herself the other day at the party, when even Baekhyun had to defer.

“Sorry.” She said, her face still in her hands. “You didn’t have to listen to that.”

“No, I wanted to.” Sehun’s voice was firm. “I wanted to listen to that.”

“I’m ridiculous, aren’t I?” Sohee pulled her hands away from her face and tried to smile. From the crestfallen expression on Sehun’s face, maybe she wasn’t doing such a great job. “Always digging at dead ends.”

Sehun didn’t answer for a long while. “Not always,” he said finally and tapped a finger on his chest. Sohee tried not to linger her eyes there for too long, not when she’d already half-forgotten about how good he looked like that. “I’m not a dead end. Okay, at least my brother isn’t one.”

Oh Segyun? Sohee frowned. Segyun was a close friend of Minseok’s, and she didn’t see how he would tell her anything. “Your brother isn’t going to tell me anything.” She pointed out, and Sehun shrugged like it was nothing.

“He’s not going to tell you anything, but he’ll tell _me_. The thing about hyung is that he likes giving me whatever I ask for. My family seems to like doing that.” She could hear the slight downtrodden tone in his voice. Sehun did have the reputation of being a first class wastrel, but maybe it was only because his family was trying to compensate for his middle child status. She thought about it, and wanted to laugh at how their families were so similar. “So if you need him to do anything, tell me and he’ll do it for me.”

Sohee considered it. “It’s going to be potentially damning for everyone.” She warned, and Sehun shrugged again. “What if it affects your family?”

“My grandfather polices us like there is no tomorrow, so any wrongdoing is stamped out before it even happens. Like, in our heads.” Sehun stretched and his shirt rose a little. Sohee kept her eyes squarely on his face. “The only time hyung’s ever been able to rebel was when he went to the army. Stayed overnight at his girlfriend’s place when he was out for the weekend once. Grandfather was _pissed_.”

“And he lets you party around like this.” Sohee said in disbelief. Sehun nodded and sat back up straight. “Your grandfather has dubious standards.”

“That’s the life of a spare.” He turned all the way around in his seat to look at her again. “So do you want my help, or do you not?”

Sohee stared at him. He stared back. She wondered why he wanted to help her, because apart from the very obvious flirtation that he’d been trying to pull off, there really wasn’t any good reason behind him risking himself to find out a truth that would put everything he had on the line. Sohee expected less from people in her kind of world, the one where people without a conscience thrived and those with one were trampled upon. She looked at Jia and pitied the poor girl. Kris wasn’t one to give any promises. But maybe she had underestimated the amount of goodness that Sehun possessed. The way that he had stood up without thinking during the party was more than enough to prove that he wasn’t like the rest of them.

She leaned forward, so close that she could almost touch his forehead with her fingers. He didn’t flinch. She looked at him hard, so that she could be sure that he was real. That she wasn’t going to make the wrong decision in trusting him and taking an insane leap of faith that would cost the both of them too much. Sehun blinked, and then he touched the tips of her fingers with his own.

“Yes.”

 

* * *

 

Minseok shook the curtains of the windows open, and the weak rays of the early morning poured in. His personal apartment faced downtown Los Angeles, and had a spectacular view that everyone who visited seemed to envy. Lu Han, with all of his ultra-expensive property, had actually wanted to spend the night once when he’d invited his very small group of high school friends over for a private gathering. He’d been drunk, however, so Minseok had disallowed it. Another reason was that he didn’t trust Lu Han all that much, but he didn’t have to tell him that.

The only person that Minseok fully placed almost blind faith in was Segyun. It was natural, really, because the Ahns and Ohs were family friends by the generation, and they were both the ones being groomed to succeed. Segyun had only moved to the States in middle school, but it didn’t matter much when they would spend the next half of a decade together all the time. Minseok knew that it was too clearly stupid to place so much trust in someone who wasn’t bound to him by blood, but he also knew that Segyun wasn’t someone who would break the code that he’d sworn them both to by virtue of their friendship. Segyun and Minseok, he often thought, were almost the same. Eldest sons, prospective heirs, clutching too much information in their hands that they had no idea how to handle. But at least Minseok didn’t have to deal with a problematic middle child brother.

His phone buzzed in his pocket, and Minseok picked it up without looking at the screen. He’d been expecting this call.

“My brother is an idiot.” Segyun cut to the chase immediately, and Minseok laughed. “Please don’t laugh.”

“Only in agreement.” Minseok laughed again, and dropped himself into the leather chair behind his oak desk. The document that he’d pulled up last night was still on the screen, burning rather harshly through its pixels. Minseok frowned at it. “What did he do again?”

“I don’t know who he’s been talking to, but he asked about the Wangs.” Segyun’s voice crackled over the phone, obviously vexed. Minseok grimaced. Their families dealt with the Wangs extensively, Minseok’s more so than Segyun’s, but they both had a very good idea of what kind of people they were. Minseok liked Feifei well enough and thought her to be a capable leader, but he had no kind opinions on her father. “Why does he want to know?”

“What is he asking?” Minseok said and scrolled through his document. It was a detailed listing of the Wangs’ banking records with them. It had no business being on his personal computer, but Minseok knew that nobody would bother actually talking to him about this. Their global GM had difficulty even looking him in the eye whenever they had meetings together. Minseok had cultivated exactly the kind of persona that his father had wanted him to—calm, collected, ruthless. It irritated him that he was still going to eventually go down the path that he had so desperately wanted to avoid.

“He—” Segyun paused for a moment, like he was finding it far too difficult to say what he was going to next. “He asked me for a favour. From you. Do you know that the last time he asked me for help, he was Seyun’s age and wanted a new life-size motor toy car?”

Minseok’s upper lip curled as he stopped scrolling. The cursor blinked periodically next to the abnormally neat figures that were going out of the Wang accounts at set intervals. Always the same amount, but never to the same people. Even a slow intern would be able to catch how weird this was, but nobody did. The executives who handled the Wang accounts reported only to his father, and now him. It was gnawing at him, but Minseok understood the rules of the game. Never rat your customers out.

“And you gave it to him?” It wasn’t even a question, because he already knew the answer.

“I gave it to him.” Segyun sounded far too resigned, and Minseok stared at the figures. “You have Sohee, you should understand how tough it is to deal with a kid who has it in his head that the family’s given up on him because of birth order. Sehun’s a little shit, but he’s my brother.”

Minseok closed his eyes briefly. “Don’t put my sister in the same sentence as Sehun.”

“Fine,” Segyun said and made a noise of disapproval, “then _you_ tell me what I should tell him. The favour he’s asking me for has to ultimately come from you.”

Minseok looked at the document for a long moment, before he clicked it shut. “Segyun, this isn’t just about a toy car anymore. You know how the Wangs are like. You’ve dealt with them, you’ve done business with them, and you know exactly how fucked up their entire company is.”

“Yeah, which makes ratting them out an delible stain on my conscience.” Segyun muttered.

“They will fuck you up if you even try.” Minseok could hear how Segyun was actually wavering. “The old Wang is vicious. He has money going out to at least twenty different accounts per week. How much of that money do you want to bet is to the biggest mafia in their country?”

“You mean their Party.” Segyun said darkly and Minseok let out a hollow chuckle. “I know. Do you know how much fucking shit we have to go through whenever we’re in China? Minseok, I can see things for myself.”

“So tell me why the fuck do you think I’m going to leak the Wang accounts for your brother?” Minseok asked in a quiet snarl. Segyun kept his silence for a second, before he spoke again.

“Because you have a conscience. Look, I don’t know exactly how far back your records run, but you must know that the Wangs are trying to deepen their roots. That online shopping mall? Don’t tell you have no idea what made it possible. You’re fully aware that they’re fucking dirty, Minseok. Don’t make yourself the same. Don’t play their game because they fucking want you to.”

Minseok stared at the wallpaper of his computer. It was a family photo, taken after his graduation. Sohee looked happy, for once. His family was dysfunctional, of course, like all _chaebol_ families were, but that didn’t mean that he didn’t love it. For all of his reluctance to step up to the heir plate, Minseok was willing to do anything to keep his family together, even if it meant having to keep quiet about things that he didn’t personally stand for. But now as Segyun spoke quietly over the phone, for himself maybe but more than anything for Sehun, Minseok felt himself waver. He never faltered, never, not even when his grandfather had insulted his inability to clinch a particular customer that he hadn’t even known about in the first place. But now his will shook, just a little.

“Don’t get preachy.” He said, finally, and Segyun let out a deep sigh. He sounded like he was about to say something more, when there was a knock on the door. Minseok listened as his butler reported a Mr. Zhang’s arrival.

“I need to go. But we’ll talk about this again.” He knew he sounded a lot like the clipped, serious version of him at work, but Minseok really didn’t want to prolong this discussion. Segyun said a goodbye, before the line cut off. Minseok looked at his phone for a moment, before standing up and walking out.

He found Yixing standing in the middle of his living room, gazing out of his floor-length windows in something that seemed to be amazement. Minseok had never been extremely close to Yixing, mainly because he was a year younger and the Zhangs only had a few accounts open with them in the U.S.. They got along well, nonetheless, but Minseok now felt that he was one of the few people that deserved the respect everyone else accorded them simply because they were rich.

“Hi.” Yixing said when he turned back. “I brought Mew Mew.”

Minseok reached over to pat the cat on its head. It purred and settled back to sleep. When his butler had taken it away in its cage, Minseok motioned for Yixing to sit. He did, and Minseok could see the faint edges of dark circles under his eyes.

“How’s Lu Han?”

“I want to say fine,” Yixing said a little blankly, “but I can’t. The most I can say is that he’s okay. Living. Alive?”

“That’s good enough.” Minseok said briskly, and his butler reappeared with a full set of teacups and an ornate teapot. His mother had bought the china, and Minseok knew that Yixing was fond of tea. “At least he’s still alive.”

Yixing took a cup and sipped slowly. Minseok held on to his and looked out of the window. The sky was now much brighter, and the layer of white clouds that spread beyond the vista of downtown Los Angeles was breathtaking. Lu Han would like this.

“Sorry that Mew Mew has to come stay over,” Yixing said after a while. Minseok shrugged and put his teacup down. It didn’t really matter much to him, not when nobody else but him alone lived in this apartment. Sohee didn’t like cats too much, but she didn’t come over here often either. “I just didn’t think that either of us could take care of her too well now.”

Minseok cast him a curious look. Yixing looked down at his lap. There were things being left unsaid, and Minseok had a feeling that he knew what they were. It was just a matter of if Yixing wanted to say them out loud, or not.

“Why? Lu Han’s fucked up, but you’re not.” He said, maybe a little too candidly. But it was the truth. Yixing was the most grounded person in their L.A. social circle that Minseok could think of. Yixing looked up at him, and Minseok inclined his head nonchalantly.

“I’ve been—” Yixing blinked at him, then looked out of the window. “—busy. With stuff.”

“Right.” Minseok nodded slowly. “I’d rather be busier with a girl too.”

Yixing continued staring out of the window but Minseok could see his ears and the entire back of his neck turn red. It wasn’t difficult to know what was going on in their circles, not when gossip travelled faster than light, and when the girl Yixing was so frequently seen around with nowadays was not part of them. Minseok knew who Meng Jia was, and her ordinariness wasn’t a sin to him.

“You do know that the gossip patrol hasn’t been very nice to her.” Minseok said and reached for a biscuit. “She’s still sort of dating Kris.”

“I know.” Yixing said slowly. “But so?”

“So,” Minseok finished the biscuit and dusted his hands off. Outside the living room he could hear the butler carefully going about his duties. “Crossing a Wang wouldn’t do you any good.”

Yixing looked at him in measured silence for a moment. Minseok genuinely didn’t want anything to happen to Yixing. Everything that had happened lately convinced him that there were very few people who didn’t deserve their comeuppance when it came, but Yixing wasn’t one of them. Droves of people flocked to Lu Han when he was out and about, but now that he’d enclosed himself off from the world, Yixing was the only one who had stayed. That was respectable enough to Minseok.

“Sometimes, I think people forget that I’m a Zhang.” He said carefully, and there was a beat before Minseok laughed.

“True.” Minseok conceded. Yixing still looked very serious. It wasn’t a good sign, he thought, and what he was going to say wasn’t going to be nice, but he had to. Minseok considered Yixing a friend. The real sort. “Which is why she’s going to be the one to bear the brunt of everything. If she breaks up with Kris and gets together with you, even if it’s much later, who do you think they’re going to blame? There can only be one gender for a gold digger.”

Yixing’s mouth opened, before he closed it again. Minseok knew how their world functioned, intimately, and he was sure that Yixing did too. They had grown up learning how to speak, and how to use it to their advantage. The socialite life was one of glamorous backstabbing, and even if they didn’t have any interest in doing it personally, it was still ingrained into their lives. Meng Jia wasn’t one of them, but now that her name was associated with Kris’s, she had to pay the same price.

“We’re just friends.” Yixing said stiffly, as Minseok leaned back into the sofa. His mother had picked it out from some place in Milan, hand-carved and gilded with a dark gold. “Are they going to shame me for having a friend?”

“A friend who isn’t rich, yes.” Minseok shrugged and said frankly.

“It’s none of their business.” Yixing shot back, and Minseok saw a gleam of anger in his eyes. Interesting. Yixing had always been relatively calm in face of anything. His position as a non-heir always made him the butt of sly, subtle comments, but he never did seem to care. Now he was angry over a girl that he wasn’t even dating. “I can be friends with whoever I want, and they should keep those mouths shut.”

“They’re not going to be talking about you,” he pointed out, and Yixing frowned. “But if you think you can shield Meng Jia from all of this, sure. You’re a Zhang, you can do whatever Zhang Liyin can. Even better too.”

The heir to the Zhang fortune was about as ruthless as he was, Minseok thought, but if Yixing was riled up enough in the right direction, there was no saying what he could be capable of. If anyone were to touch Meng Jia, it did seem like he would be angry enough to do _something_. Minseok didn’t know if he wanted to see that happen. Somehow it was already clear to him that it would not go down well for anyone involved in that situation.

Yixing stared at the half-empty plate of biscuits for a moment, before nodding very tersely. Minseok reached over to clasp a hand on his shoulder, and remained there for a moment, before he drew away.

 

* * *

 

Kris left the office when the sun was low in the sky, casting the city in a deep orange glow. As if balancing classes and growing responsibility at the company wasn’t enough already, Kris felt more troubled by his step-sister with every passing day. The more she lied to him, the more afraid he became that she hid a secret darker than anything he’d imagined. He thought back to the first time he realized she was hiding something, back in Shanghai, when he followed her to her mother’s grave. That seemed like a lifetime ago. And she only grew more taciturn.

Scowling, Kris dug in his pocket for the keys to his Jaguar. The setting sun shone into the parking garage, bathing everything in its warm light. He resolved to push Feifei harder for answers, because a deep fear burned in his chest. Whatever Feifei wanted, neither she nor anyone else in the world had Kris’s best interests in mind. Only he could look out for himself. His mother had drilled that in his head for years, reminding him that not even she could guarantee him anything. If he wanted any sort of secure future, he had to know what Feifei hid behind her fake smiles and cold words.

He didn’t notice the person sitting on the low concrete wall until he was nearly at his car. Then he looked up and saw Jia, perched there between his car and the empty spot next to it, her legs crossed and her arms curled around herself. His heart beat harder. He knew he’d screwed up, letting her calls ring unanswered and avoiding her whenever she tried to talk to him at work. But every time he looked at her, he thought about what she knew now—that he was the kid of a criminal, the unwanted son of a man who had everything and squandered it. She could tell anyone, spread the truth around, and Kris would be back where he started, the gangly middle schooler pretending he didn’t hear his classmates’ ridicule. And before that, the quiet child asking his mother why they had to move into a dump of an apartment, and getting slapped in response. Every time Kris looked at Jia, he wished he could take back everything he’d confided in her. No one should know those things about him. Not even her.

She stood up as he approached, her arms still wrapped around herself.

“I would have called you,” he said, irritable. He regretted it immediately when he saw her wince, and she avoided his eyes. He didn’t mean it that way—he _would have_ , but he needed time to—he didn’t know. Hide, until he was sure she wasn’t going to throw him away like trash.

“I really have to talk to you,” Jia said. She looked up and Kris saw that she seemed to be in pain, and his heart beat harder. She was going to break up with him.

“Now?” Kris asked. “In a parking garage?”

He laughed a little, like the situation was ridiculous, but Jia’s expression didn’t change. Inevitably Kris was the kind of guy who got dumped. His freshman year of college he’d let himself get too close to a girl. She was American, so far away from the world of Chinese politics and wealth that it was incomprehensible to her, and he loved her for it. He loved her, more than he’d ever loved another person, and when she broke up with him to get back together with her high school sweetheart, he swore he would never let another person get so close. Jia, he realized now, was the only person who had broken through his first line of defense. He shouldn’t have let her become anything more than a one-night stand.

“You’ve avoided me everywhere else,” Jia said. She chewed on her lip and Kris hated himself for how much he wanted to beg her to stay with him. He wouldn’t beg. He wouldn’t ask anyone for anything. And it wasn’t like they were going to be together forever, anyway. His mother reminded him frequently that he needed to marry with his future in mind. But even so—even so he and Jia could still be together. His marriage would be a political alliance, after all, and maybe Jia would understand that.

He pushed past her and pulled hard on the handle of his car door. “I’m supposed to be at a dinner in fifteen minutes,” he said tersely, swinging his bag inside. He stopped, gritted his teeth, and looked back at her. “I don’t have time for this.” He turned to climb into his car.

“Kris!” Jia grabbed hold of his arm, forcing him to look into her wide, imploring eyes. “Kris, I’m pregnant.”


	10. 抱衾與裯

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris reacts to Jia's surprise announcement, Jia makes a decision, and Yixing has an illuminating dinner with Liyin. Sohee finds herself in a sticky spot with Sehun, Zitao doesn't know if he's inching closer to his Olympic dream, and Chanyeol provides vital information. Feifei makes a shocking discovery, and her hand is forced.

 

 

抱衾與裯  
_bearing our coverlets and sheets_

 

 

The sound of a passing car filled up the silence swelling between Kris and Jia.

“What?” fell ineloquently from Kris’s lips. He couldn’t process what she said, and like a CD with a scratch her words kept repeating again and again in his head. She hadn’t moved, stood as still and calm as though she were porcelain.

But her voice sounded neither cold nor calm. “I’m pregnant,” she said again, more firmly this time. Kris wanted to push the words out of the air and back into her mouth. He wanted to wake up from sleep and find himself alone in bed. There was no way this could be his real life.

“You’re sure?” he asked. Meant to ask. Even to his own ears his words sounded like a harsh demand.

Jia stared at him, unmoving, for a long moment, and then she nodded her head slowly. His stomach twisted and he leaned against the side of his car. “But—we always—” he said, grasping at the air for an explanation that would make her words go away.

“Lu Han’s party,” she said in an empty voice. “You were—” she gestured haphazardly in the air for a moment and then let her hand drop and she looked at some point behind his head. Kris remembered. He’d been reckless. He wanted her in that moment. He’d done the very thing he’d been schooled not to do for his entire life, and lived according to his present desires, rather than keeping his future in mind.

She seemed like a stranger to him, distant and unreadable. Kris ran a hand back through his hair and tried to think. He had to think. He couldn’t be a father. He couldn’t be a father because—because absolutely nothing in his life prepared him—because he and Jia weren’t even that serious—because his mother would never forgive—because he wasn’t even—because he _couldn’t._ Looking down that road, all he could see was an impenetrable darkness.

“You can’t—” he said, faltered, and started over. “You aren’t planning to have it, are you?”

Jia’s eyes shifted very slowly from the point behind Kris’s head to meet his again. But she didn’t say anything. The look in her eyes was as dark and unfathomable as the road he imagined leading toward their future if the two of them brought a child into the world.

“Jia,” he said, “We—we can’t. We can’t have a kid. There’s no—we just—we _can’t_. You know we can’t.”

Jia closed her eyes for a second. He couldn’t guess at what she was thinking. His skin prickled with heat and he felt bile rising in his throat. His heart thumped hard. He ran his hand back through his hair again and realized he’d done the same motion only a few seconds before. Pregnant. If he could go back in time he would.

“Why not?” Jia asked so softly he could almost pretend she hadn’t asked something so obviously absurd.

His throat felt like it was closing up and his heartbeat ran wild. “We _can’t_ ,” he repeated. “Jia—” He almost reached out for her, but stopped himself. She still looked so distant, like someone he didn’t know. Like she hated him. Did she hate him? It took two people to make a child, after all, it wasn’t like he was solely responsible but—god, they could not have a child.

“Why not?” she asked again, her voice stronger this time.

Kris felt his heart slow and his resolve become firm. He had answers if she wanted them. He had reason on his side, not only reason but _wisdom,_ really. He took several breaths before he spoke, wary of saying the wrong thing when she seemed to already be considering the impossible option.

“Jia, _how_? How the hell would we go about this?” He rubbed his palm against his neck and watched her eyes shift to that place behind his head again. “You think, what? We get married, play house? We’d hate each other. You know we would hate each other.”

In some space in his head he knew exactly what he wasn’t saying. He wasn’t mentioning the gossip that would follow them for months, even years. It wasn’t that a mistake had landed them in an inconvenient marriage—Kris had seen that played out at plenty of weddings—but that Jia was relatively poor, and hadn’t done much to endear herself within their circles. Kris didn’t think she’d be able to do endear herself elsewhere, either. Starting with his mother, who would despise her. Kris could hear his mother’s voice in his imagination, how she’d call Jia a whore behind closed doors and scold her to her face, how she’d never forgive Kris for putting such a shameful blot on their rise back to their proper place in society. If Kris’s father were to find out, Kris was sure he would laugh.

“We don’t have to get married,” Jia said. “I never said anything about that.”

“Then why the hell are you _here_?” The words came out before Kris had thought about them, bypassing consideration and leaping out of his mouth. But he couldn’t fathom what she was doing here if she didn’t plan to ask him to do something, whatever that something was.

Her eyes met his again. Every time this happened Kris felt as though she was more distant and more cold, which made him even more frightened. They couldn’t have a child but he couldn’t lose her, either. He needed her but without the problem in the mix. He needed her the way things were _supposed_ to be and not the way everything was happening right now.

“You fathered a child,” she said. “You should know.”

“There’s no child yet!” Kris cried out. “You can undo this mistake, okay, there’s no reason for either of us to ruin our lives when you have a million options and Jia, no one will ever know, we can move on with our lives and—and we’ll be okay. That’s the only way we’ll be okay.”

Jia blinked. Every time she fell silent Kris felt a deep shiver rattle him all the way into his bones. Shaking, he stepped forward and wrapped his arms around her. She didn’t return the hug but maybe if he held onto her tight enough he could bring her back from whatever land of fear and delusion she’d fallen into, return her to reality with him.

“Look,” Kris said, resting his cheek against the top of her head, breathing in the scent of her shampoo that was so familiar to him now. “I’ll pay for everything, okay? If you—if you need support I’ll go with you and I’ll be right beside you the whole time but—but Jia, you can’t go through with this. Don’t do that me. Don’t do that to yourself.”

She still hadn’t moved and stood stiffly in his arms. When he first saw her sitting beside his car, he thought she was going to dump him. She wasn’t, but he still might lose her. He couldn’t be a father and he also couldn’t bear to lose her. He stepped back and cupped her cheeks in his hands, lifting her head until their eyes met. He’d kiss her if he thought she’d kiss him back, if he thought the real Jia was in there.

“Jia,” he pleaded. He couldn’t be the failure his mother feared he’d be, the one his father expected him to be. And she shouldn’t ruin her life over a mistake, either. She had to know this. She had to.

She reached up and wrapped her hands around his, pulling them away from her cheeks and holding them loosely in her own. Her gaze fell away from his and dropped to the ground.

“I need time to think through everything,” she said to the concrete. Kris moved his hands to grip hers.

“Jia,” he said again, empty of words. Terror filled the cavity in his chest.

“I’ll consider it,” she said, her eyes never leaving the ground. She stepped away and her hands slid away from his. He watched as she walked away, taking in the slump of her thin shoulders. She never looked back at him, not even once.

Kris climbed into his car, slammed the door shut, and rested his head on the steering wheel. He remained very still until he conquered the urge to cry. Jia would understand. He had to make sure she understood him. She had to.

 

 

* * *

 

She’d asked for time to think over everything, but Jia’s mind was quiet.

As she climbed the steps of the parking garage to the upper level where her own used Honda was parked, she pondered her emotions, like she was examining herself in a petri dish, pulling apart the thin and sticky specimen but reaching no conclusions. Even fear seemed like a distant, unrecognizable feeling, though on some level she knew she was scared.

After her conversation with Yixing a week earlier, she’d gone to a drugstore and purchased a pregnancy test, already half-certain of what it would say. When it turned positive, she’d sat on the tile of her bathroom floor for a long time, staring at nothing. Even now as she turned her keys in the lock of her car door, all her decisions were only partially formed, and she lived each day mechanically following her routine, unable to piece out what steps to take next. She dreamed of home, frequently—of the house in the countryside where her grandparents lived, of the carelessness and ease she enjoyed as a little girl. But even these daydreams she struggled to understand in the context of her situation.

She started the car and sat for a moment, her hands gripping the steering wheel, trying to put a name to the feeling pressing heavily on her chest. But she couldn’t find one. It was as though her feelings now transcended description, and as much as she wanted things to be fixed as simply as Kris insisted they could be, it wasn’t possible. The very thought of an abortion left her trembling, fear clawing at her throat.

She pulled out of the parking garage, forcing herself to keep a careful eye on the road as she drove. It wasn’t as though abortion was taboo to her. One of her high school best friends had gotten one, and Jia had gone to the clinic with her, waiting there until it was over and walking home together arm-in-arm. That friend never regretted it. As Kris had said, Jia’s friend knew better than to ruin her life over a mistake.

But Jia wasn’t Kris and she wasn’t her high school friend, and she knew that it wasn’t so simple for her. When her parents first found out they were expecting a child, they’d gone to a fortune teller who informed them the child would be a girl. Jia’s grandparents urged them to get an abortion, reminding them that they had one shot at this, and should try again for a boy. But her parents adamantly refused, instead bringing Jia into the world, female and thus unwanted. Except her parents always wanted her. Jia couldn’t remember a single time over the years when her parents hadn’t been quick to remind her how much they cherished her, their only daughter, their only child. Jia first found out about the fortune teller and the advised abortion when she was fifteen and her grandmother, spiraling into dementia, told her the whole story in great detail, finishing with a short “And they should have listened to me!” Jia hadn’t been able to hold back her tears later when she happened to be alone with her father. Teenage angst already made her feel worthless, and maybe she was as unwanted as she felt. Her father—a gruff man of few words—held her close to him and told her, “Sometimes there is grace in doing the thing everyone else thinks is foolish.”

Her current situation was undoubtedly foolish, from start to finish. Jia should not have let herself end up here, pulling into the parking lot of her apartment in America and considering bringing an illegitimate child into the world. Kris would, she was certain, pay for everything and go with her to the clinic and support her. But only if she chose to erase their mistake. If she chose not to, she doubted he would be able to do much of anything for her. Terror shrouded his eyes when he spoke and shook in his voice.

Jia got out of the car and climbed the stairs up to the apartment. Inside, the small rooms were cool and dusky. Hyerim wasn’t home, then. Jia still hadn’t told her roommate that she was pregnant—hadn’t told anyone but Kris. She glanced at the clock on her way back to her bedroom and saw that her parents would be awake now. She should call them. She should tell them. They would be disappointed and worried, but they would know what to do.

Her hand shook as she pulled up WeChat and dialed her mother. She left the video call off—her mother said it was cumbersome anyway, but Jia was sure that if she saw her mother’s face, she would start crying and wouldn’t be able to stop. The thought of telling her made Jia’s heart pound rapidly in her chest. She sat down on the floor by her bed and waited for her mother to pick up.

“Hello?” Her mother’s voice came clearly over the phone. Jia was on the opposite side of the globe, a massive ocean between them. The distance, which seemed so insignificant when Jia was happy and busy with school, seemed vast now.

“Hey, ma,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady.

Nevertheless, her mother noted Jia’s tone immediately and asked, “What’s wrong?”

Jia brushed away the tear that slipped out and down her cheek. Her mother had such a brisk, harsh way of talking, but it was all bark and no bite. No one cared as deeply as her mother. Although Jia teased her mother often with gushy “I love you’s” that were met with an eye roll, Jia knew how deeply her mother loved her. She knew it when she was planning to come to America and her mother saved money for a whole year, unknown to either Jia or her father, bargaining vendors down and charming visitors to their restaurant into buying the highest-priced dishes. Then she gave all the money to Jia and walked away without a word, careful to hide her tears.

How could Jia tell her the truth?

“I think,” Jia said as carefully as she could, afraid of betraying anything, “I think I want to come home after I graduate.”

Her mother’s silence filled up the line for a long moment and Jia held her breath and waited.

“Did something happen?” her mother demanded. “I thought you were going to stay on with your internship? What happened?”

Jia counted to ten before she answered. “It’s—it’s nothing, Ma, I’m just not cut out for the business world. They’re really cutthroat, you know? I’m not mean enough.”

Her mother made a soft _mm_ of understanding. “I always thought it was strange, you being friends with that socialite. She was in the paper the other day. It was very strange.”

Jia thought about Feifei, and imagined telling her about the pregnancy. She could almost laugh, imagining Feifei’s outrage. But underneath that would be a deep disappointment, even contempt. Jia couldn’t tell Feifei. She adored her friend, but she couldn’t tell her this.

“Yeah, it’s different being her friend and being her employee,” Jia said with a laugh, wiping another tear away. “I got to thinking, you know, you all are expanding the restaurants and what if I came and worked for you? Put my fancy American PR degree to good use.”

Her mother was silent again. Jia’s tears were coming faster, now, but she managed not to make any noise that would be heard over the phone. She thought about telling her mother the truth. Opened her mouth to do it. But the words _I’m pregnant_ lodged in her throat. Oh, her mother would be so disappointed. Jia should have known better and kept her legs together instead of climbing into bed with a boy for the euphoric intimacy that never did last. Jia always wanted it to last. That was her problem. She wasn’t the girl she pretended to be, that was clear to her now. Even with Kris, she’d only gone home with him that first night because she had a feeling it would turn into something more. Unfortunately, it had.

“Jia,” her mother said finally, “sweetheart, what’s wrong?”

The uncharacteristic term of endearment forced Jia to hold the phone away from her and bite hard on her thumb so she wouldn’t start sobbing. Kris was right. This mistake could be undone. No one would know what kind of situation Jia had gotten herself into. She’d never have to tell.

But she couldn’t do it. She didn’t think she could do it.

Finally she put her phone back to her ear and squeezed out some normal-sounding words. “I’m just homesick,” she said.

Her mother took a deep breath, like she wasn’t sure what to do. “Well,” she said, “If you want to come home, your father and I will be happier than I can say. We miss you.”

“I miss you too,” Jia said. She looked up at the ceiling and felt her tears run down her temples, back into her hair and around her ears. What would her parents say, when she came home pregnant? Depending on when she bought her plane ticket, she would be three or four months by then. The night before she looked up a little chart on the internet to see if she could get away with hiding her pregnancy until she graduated. She looked at the curved stomach of the pregnant woman in the drawing and took in shallow, nervous breaths—but she could get away with it. Apparently women didn’t show much for a long time. After she looked up the drawing she went through her closet and picked out all her loosest clothing. But even if no one else noticed, Jia’s mother would know the second Jia got off the plane. What a way to come home.

“Talk to your father,” Jia’s mother said, and there was the rustling as the phone was handed over. Jia listened to the silence that followed that meant her father was waiting for Jia to speak first.

“Hi,” Jia said. She wiped her tears away with the palm of her hand. “I think I’m going to come home after I graduate.”

Her father made a gruff sound in his throat as a reply. Jia grinned up at the ceiling, imagining his somber face, the lines around his eyes, his strong arms and the scent of his favorite tea.

“Ba,” she said, struggling to keep her voice steady. “You know that thing you told me a long time ago? About how there is grace in doing the thing everyone else thinks is foolish?” She paused and drew in a deep breath. “Is that true?”

She listened to the sound of him breathing. Even though she was scared out of her mind, she wanted him to say that it was true. She needed him to say that it was true.

“In my life, it has been,” he said finally. “There were lots of things. The restaurant. You. Especially you. If I relived my life a thousand times I would always choose to have you.”

Jia barely managed to hold back her tears. She got out, “Thanks. I have to go.”

As soon as her father said goodbye, she hung up the phone. She wrapped her arms around her knees and sank down to the floor, lying there curled around herself, and sobbed.

 

 

* * *

 

Yixing had an ongoing habit of having weekly dinners with Liyin, one that had been cut off in the past few weeks because he was so busy with trying to fix everything that was going wrong in everyone’s lives but his. But Liyin called the night before, and from the tone of her voice Yixing could tell that his cousin meant it when she said she wanted to see him. Liyin was a wonderful older sister, definitely, but she could deliver a mean smackdown if needed. So he was here, pulling up outside the lobby of Kim Jongdae’s posh apartment complex in his black, slightly battered BMW. Yixing didn’t enjoy collecting cars as much as his friends did.

He watched as Liyin appeared in the lobby through the glass doors, holding hands with Jongdae. She always looked wonderfully happy whenever she was around him, Yixing thought absentmindedly. It was a side of her that their employees never got to see much. Liyin believed in being a stern but benevolent boss. Jongdae kissed her before he let go of her hand. Liyin smiled at him, before pushing the door open and walking towards his car. Yixing let out a small laugh as Jongdae watched all the way until Liyin had gotten into the BMW, and then turning around to take the elevator back up.

“Hello, Mr. Busy.” Liyin said as she buckled up. Yixing made a face and turned the car out. “Would you have remembered to, you know, actually have dinner with me if I hadn’t called yesterday?”

“ _Yes_ , jie.” He said and it wasn’t that much of a lie. If Yixing had looked at his calendar he would have remembered, but it was now filled with the colour code that belonged to Jia. So maybe Liyin was right, but he wasn’t going to admit that in her face. “I’m sorry, please allow me to pay for your steak tonight.”

Liyin scrunched up her nose. “I don’t want steak. We’re Sichuanese, it’s hot pot or nothing else.”

“Does Jongdae indulge this habit?” He teased, and Liyin hit him on the shoulder. “It’s still so weird to be picking up your cousin from her boyfriend’s place.”

“Only if you’re imagining weird things,” Liyin said and rolled her eyes. Yixing laughed again. He felt more relaxed than he had been in weeks. Being around his family helped, he thought, because they were so tightly-knit. Yixing had grown up in a household that prized being together above anything else, which was apparently weird to everyone else around them.

They stopped at a red light after a few minutes, and Liyin took the chance to glance at her phone. Yixing thought it was business-related, because she was such a workaholic, but realised that Liyin was smiling to herself. Again, this was a sight that her subordinates would never get to witness, and it occurred to him that she was actually truly in love. It was a funny realisation.

“Jie,” he said and Liyin looked up, “how are you so happy?”

“What do you mean?” Liyin asked as they turned out onto another street. Yixing mused for a moment. It was just so disconcerting for him, to see her bask in happiness while everyone else around him seem to sink deeper and deeper in a desperation that he couldn’t seem to hold off for them. Lu Han was drowning but Yixing couldn’t pull him up. He didn’t want to be pulled up.

“I mean…” They were approaching Chinatown now, and Yixing glanced at his rear mirror. Traffic was heavy, as always. Life was going on as usual, but the normality was what struck him the most. That while everyone else was going about their lives, they were wallowing in a set of problems that didn’t seem resolvable. “Have you heard about Lu Han?”

Liyin’s face fell. Yixing pressed his lips together and turned into a private, quiet alley where their restaurant was located. They were old customers now, so exclusive that they didn’t need a reservation for a table. Liyin put down her phone, and took a while before she spoke again.

“All employees talk,” she said, like she was choosing her words carefully, “and those who work in Lu Han’s house are not otherwise.”

So she had, Yixing thought. Liyin looked him in the eyes, and he blinked back. His cousin was always one step ahead of everyone else, intuitive and perceptive enough to hold the fort on her own. But could she help him? Could she help Lu Han, when she already didn’t like him by sheer virtue of his surname?

“Then you should know that he’s this close to wasting himself away. He’s not telling me anything, and I don’t know if I’m going to go home tonight and see him dead on his bedroom floor because he overdosed on something.”

Yixing said it very quietly but he was sure that Liyin heard every single word. Her face was still expressionless, and she looked at him again for a while more, before she let out a small sigh and closed her eyes. She opened them again, and Yixing wanted her to say that she would help. Tell him something. Anything.

“He won’t kill himself.” Liyin said finally, and Yixing pulled up to the restaurant. The valet waited outside, but he wasn’t in a hurry to open the doors yet. “The Lu pride is strong. They would never die the death of a coward.”

She smiled sardonically, and Yixing knew that he was now even further away from an answer—if she was even going to give him one in the first place.

The valet took his keys as Yixing trailed Liyin into the restaurant. Their server was speaking to her in the front, and he watched as his cousin nodded elegantly at whatever suggestions the server was making for their dinner. He wondered, suddenly, if Lu Han was refusing to eat again. He had been leaving his dinners untouched outside his room door for a few weeks now.

“Yixing.” Liyin called when they had been seated and their server had retreated out of the room. He looked up at her and nodded silently. “I know this isn’t what you want me to say to you, but keep your distance. If you want to help Lu Han, stay away from him.”

“You keep saying that, but I don’t see how that _works_.” Yixing closed his eyes in frustration and took a deep breath. “If he can’t help himself, and nobody’s telling me anything, how is that going to be of any use to him? I can’t pretend not to see how much pain he is in.”

Liyin’s expression shifted but soon enough she was stoic again. Yixing couldn’t understand how she could compartmentalise everything that wasn’t about their family and the people she loved. He hadn’t thought about it before, but now as he sat here in a very expensive hot pot restaurant, in a private room lined with mahogany and oak, he realised that even Liyin was the same. All of them, inhabitants of a world padded with the weight of money, were exactly the same.

“I don’t want you to be hurt.” She said, almost robotically, but Yixing was having none of it.

“And you think it’s _okay_ if Lu Han is? He’s someone’s son too, he’s human as well!” He tried not to yell, but it was the loudest he’d ever spoken to Liyin. She looked at him, eyes unreadable.

“Yixing. Nobody’s obliged to help anybody, especially not if you’re going in blind with no idea what’s going on.” Liyin said, her voice hard, and Yixing wanted to tell her that she was wrong. He was obliged to help, because Lu Han was his friend and that was friendship for him. Yixing gave because he wanted to, and only because he wanted to.

“Then tell me! You can’t keep saying things like that and then expect me not to help.” Yixing’s voice was rising with every word, but he tried his best to keep a hold on it. Liyin looked at him, her mouth set in a severe line, and suddenly he realised that she was looking at him like she would a rogue employee. She stared at him for a while more, before her gaze dropped to her plate.

“Lu Han’s father is—” she paused, and Yixing’s heart remained strung in the air for a moment more, “—he’s dirty.”

Yixing gaped. “What?”

He repeated that dumbly for a moment. Liyin was about to say something more when the doors opened and their server came in with their soup bases. They remained quiet as their table was set up. The server nodded at them to enjoy their meal, and Yixing watched as he left the room quietly again. The pot was silent, not yet bubbling, but Yixing knew it would soon. Apt.

“Your best friend’s money comes from people who give it to them.” Liyin said as she stared at her chopsticks. She sounded casual, almost. Yixing didn’t say anything, because he didn’t know what to. When the truth he wanted was presented in front of him, he didn’t have any other option but to become mute.

“Are we—” He asked, finally, but didn’t have the heart to carry on. But Liyin knew what he was trying to ask, and shook her head.

“No. But only because our contracts are personally approved by someone in the Politburo. Grandfather always worries about how their dinners together aren’t enough to keep us in his good books, but I guess we’re better than the people paying the Procurator-General off, aren’t we? At least we’re only dealing with the Politburo.”

She laughed mirthlessly, and Yixing swallowed, the lump in his throat still not willing to go away. Did Lu Han know about this? He had to, or else he wouldn’t be allowing himself to waste away, life slowly draining out of his too-thin body. Yixing knew that Liyin was right about the strange strain of pride that the Lu family seemed to possess.

“So why stay away, Yixing? This is why. You and I aren’t big enough for the likes of this. We can’t do anything to help when Lu Han’s family goes down. If you want to be there for him when everything goes into flames, then stay away now. If you’re not implicated, then you can offer him shelter when he actually needs it.”

Liyin’s eyes burned as she spoke, and Yixing’s chest constricted. He opened his mouth and tried to say something, but nothing came out. Liyin looked at him, and then turned away to tend to the hot pot. It was already boiling over, large bubbles heaving in the soup. Yixing remained quiet as she added the ingredients in.

“I know I’m heartless, Yixing, but I only want my family to be safe.” Liyin stirred the soup with a ladle and said, her tone self-facetious. “The people who run in our circles won’t ever be nice to you, because they’re stupid enough to only look on the surface, but if I can keep danger away from you, I will. You should understand—you want to do the same for Meng Jia, don’t you?”

Yixing blinked at her. For a moment he foolishly wondered how she even knew about Jia, but then he quickly realised that she was Zhang Liyin. If she wanted to know anything, she would have it at her fingertips within half an hour. Of course she knew about Jia.

“I don’t—” He began, but she merely raised an eyebrow. “We’re friends. Lu Han and I are also friends. I mean—”

“Sure.” Liyin reached for his bowl and ladled some soup in. “I like her, anyway. But what I’m saying is, if you want to protect someone, you have to learn how to do it within your means. Maximise what you have, then use it for or against them. That’s how you do business, Yixing. You’re next-in-line, you have to learn.”

“Your kid is next-in-line, jie.” Yixing wasn’t bothered that he would never inherit the main business. It didn’t matter to him, but Liyin clicked her chopsticks at him crossly. “It’s not a big deal.”

“So you think you can do things your way just because you’re not the heir? Yixing, if you want to make it out clean, _listen_ to me.” Liyin put her chopsticks down and ran a hand through her hair. “Look. There are people out there who want to bring the Lus down. That’s fine by me, they’re a despicable family that I don’t care about, but if you’re going to stick your neck in there and think that you’re going to help matters by doing that then _that’s_ not fine. I’m not going to let you do anything stupid.”

Yixing sat very upright in his seat stoically. Liyin was staring at the boiling pot, frothing over. It looked completely uncontrollable, much like the situation Yixing now found himself in. Liyin picked up her chopsticks for a moment, before she put them down again. The china clinked against each other, a sharp, ringing sound.

“When a praying mantis is hunting, there’s always going to be a sparrow behind it.” Liyin began, her voice wavering only in the slightest. It was an old Chinese proverb, one that their grandfather favoured. He was well-versed in the acumen of business, and while their grandfather had never thought to put Yixing before Liyin in the line of succession, he was always disappointed that Yixing couldn’t play politics as well as Liyin could. Yixing continued to listen without a word.

“Be that sparrow, Yixing.” She urged. “If you want to protect the people you love, be that sparrow. Stay hidden, and strike only when the time is right.”

 

 

* * *

 

Sohee frowned as she watched Sehun’s Lamborghini peel into view in front of her. When Sehun had offered to pick her up from class so that he could share what his older brother had discovered for her, Sohee had nearly rejected him and told him to just email the files to her. Something she’d rather not acknowledge made her hold her tongue and agree instead. Now she regretted it. People coming out of the business college’s building behind her kept turning to stare. Sehun just had to put on a show.

The window on the passenger’s side rolled down and Sehun leaned over, pushing his sunglasses down and looking at her over the top of them. “Miss me?” he asked, with all the practiced charm of Seoul’s favorite playboy. Sohee rolled her eyes and made sure to slam the car door as hard as she could when she climbed into the passenger’s seat.

“Do you know where I live?” she asked.

“I have a vague idea,” Sehun said as he pulled out to the main road. He waved at some people on the street corner staring at his car, a smug little smile twisting his lips. “Minseok-hyung doesn’t hold parties there, so I don’t know exactly, but I know the area.”

Sohee kept silent as Sehun drove. It was late afternoon and she pulled out a pair of Ray-Bans to keep the light from blinding her eyes.

“How much information did your brother send you?” Sohee asked. “Did you look at it already?”

She watched Sehun’s expression slide from neutral into a small frown. She didn’t like where this was going already, and she’d only asked one question.

“He didn’t, you know, actually send me any _evidence_ yet,” Sehun said. He flashed a boyish grin her way and Sohee closed her eyes. It just _had_ to be Oh Sehun who found her when her car broke down.

“Then why are we on the way to my house right now?” Sohee asked, working hard to keep her tone level.

“I thought we could discuss all the hard work my brother is going through to break your brother’s will,” Sehun said brightly. Sohee snorted. “Hey,” Sehun shot back, “It’s pretty impressive, okay? Totally worth discussing.”

Sohee rolled her eyes. “You tricked me,” she informed him.

“Come on, Sohee,” he said, leaving off the _nuna_. Oh, she did notice, and his death was imminent.

“You should drop me off and then leave,” she said. “I could have had someone else pick me up if I’d known you were lying to me.”

“What’s a guy gotta do to spend time with you?” he asked.

“Be useful.”

He didn’t have a retort to that. She watched the street rolling by outside as they lapsed into silence. If Segyun couldn’t break down Minseok, she didn’t know what she’d do. Have to go back to her initial plan of getting information out of Chanyeol, probably.

That gave her an idea. She shouldn’t let leads go just because Sehun offered her an all-access pass to the information she _really_ needed.

“If you really want to help, I do have another idea,” Sohee said.

Sehun’s scowl faded into a smile. “What sort of idea? I like playing spy with you, you know.”

Sohee thought about responding to his last comment, but decided to ignore it. “You can help me track down Chanyeol and see what he knows. My brother has probably gotten to everyone by now and told them to shut up. He thinks I’m meddling.”

Sehun glanced over at her. “You kind of—no, you absolutely are meddling.”

“Whatever. Are you going to help me find Chanyeol?”

Sehun sighed a little and then he glanced at her a second time. They were close to her house, now, and she had the strangest feeling of regret that the drive wouldn’t last longer. Realizing this, she huffed and glared out the window, irritated with herself.

“Sure. Anything you need. I’m your guy.” He smiled and then turned into the driveway when she pointed him toward her house. “Can I use your bathroom?” he asked next.

Sohee couldn’t very well tell him no. “Fine,” she said.

At this hour, she doubted anyone would be home, except maybe some of the cleaning staff. Minseok had his own places and only came to the family home when their parents were in town. Faced with the prospect of being very alone in a very large house with Oh Sehun, Sohee felt a little queasy. Today he was dressed in a t-shirt and some very tight jeans, and she absolutely did not check out his ass as he climbed out of the car. She did not. Frustrated, she hustled out of the car and sped past him, unlocking the garage with the keypad and rushing toward the door before Sehun could catch up.

She strode into the house, her heels clicking on the tiles, and for a distraction to her thoughts, pulled out her phone and scrolled through her emails. Because of this, she didn’t notice her brother until she was already in the kitchen.

“Oh, good, you’re here,” Minseok said.

Sohee looked up, wide-eyed. Her brother casually leaned against the kitchen counter, a box of crackers open beside him and his phone out as well. What the hell was he doing here? He never came here.

“Mom called,” Minseok continued. “She and Dad—”

He stopped abruptly.

Sohee knew without turning around that Sehun had entered the room. Her brother was looking past Sohee’s head, one of the worst scowls she had ever seen growing on his face.

His eyes shifted and they looked at each other. She could see the wheels clicking in his head. A red flush was starting to grow on his neck.

“Oh Sehun,” Minseok said, not taking his eyes away from Sohee. “What are you doing sneaking around with Oh Sehun, little sis?”

They kept staring each other down. She could see her brother connecting all the dots in his head, from Segyun’s request for information to Sehun and now back to Sohee. If Minseok realized that Sohee was the one probing into the Wang family’s accounts, he would shut the whole thing down and Sohee would be back where she started, on a sinking ship and helpless to stop it.

“Well,” Sohee said tentatively.

Her brother couldn’t find out she was behind this. Sehun promised that Segyun was close and Sohee would not, would _not_ give in this easily. She had to do something. But she was going to regret this.

She cleared her throat. “We’re dating?”

All three of them froze. Sohee winced internally but kept her face impassive, willing Sehun not to say anything idiotic. She was going to regret this so much.

“Dating?” Minseok asked, his voice dripping with skepticism. “Him?”

Her brother _would_. “Well, you can see why I had to keep it a secret,” Sohee said with a roll of her eyes. “I knew you wouldn’t approve.”

Minseok slowly shifted to cross his arms over his chest. Sohee knew exactly why he did it, too—their parents had put the both of them in martial arts as children, but Minseok continued training even now. He was giving Sehun a good look at his built biceps. It was such a stupid assertion of power that Sohee had to stop herself before she rolled her eyes. Were all brothers this ridiculous, or just hers?

“It’s not so much that I don’t approve,” Minseok said. “Although I don’t. I’m just wondering what the hell _you_ see in him.”

Sohee could almost hate her brother. He always had to be so skeptical, so cynical, so doubtful of his little sister—of course, she was lying to his face, but still. She raked a hand through her hair and reminded herself to stay calm.

“Sehun is,” she said, her mind tumbling forward, searching for something she could say with a shred of honesty. “Charismatic?”

She didn’t have to turn around to imagine Sehun’s smile going up about a billion watts. She wasn’t at all surprised when his arm landed heavily around her shoulders. It took all her willpower not to punch him in the stomach and shove him aside.

“Charismatic,” Minseok repeated. His eyes flicked to Sehun’s for a moment. Sohee refused to look at Sehun, but he was definitely far, far too pleased with this situation. Her brother’s eyebrow arched. “So, you don’t have any problems with him?”

Sohee gave one scoffing laugh. “Of course I have problems with him! He’s Oh Sehun.”

Her brother’s eyebrow arched higher and Sohee pedaled backwards.

“But,” she continued, “I find all the problems—” She mentally heaved a huge sigh. She was going to regret all of this so, so much. “—a turn on.”

A beat while Sehun radiated silent glee and Minseok’s other eyebrow lifted.

“So,” Minseok said, “You’re telling me that you don’t care that he used to date Krystal Jung, the girl who beat you in every single club you joined from ages five to fifteen.”

Sehun cut in then. “Krystal and I really weren’t that serious,” he said quickly. Oh, he was enjoying this too much. Sohee made a mental note to murder him.

“I’m an adult now, oppa,” Sohee said, mustering as scathing a tone as she could. “The blatant favoritism everyone showed toward Krystal Jung doesn’t bother me anymore”

“Uh-huh.” Minseok folded his arms across his chest and leaned back against the counter again. “And it doesn’t bother you that last week I was at a party where Sehun here was offering kissing technique evaluations to anyone as drunk as he was.”

“That was a public service,” Sehun interjected. “People can’t improve their technique without critique.”

Sohee closed her eyes briefly and opened them again. Yep, she was still here. Lying to her brother and dating Oh Sehun.

“No,” she managed to get out. “Doesn’t bother me.”

“It doesn’t bother you that your mouth has been in the same place as Jackson Wang’s?” Minseok’s eyebrow arched again as he nodded his head toward Sehun. Oh, Sohee was going to kill them both.

“It was a public service!” Sehun cried out. “I can’t turn anyone away! And, god, he is a terrible kisser.”

Sohee couldn’t restrain herself, and leaned back to get a look at Sehun. “Maybe because you were both _drunk_?”

“You know I am _always_ a great kisser, drunk or not—baby.”

Sohee wondered how much a medieval torture machine would cost and whether or not she could use it to successfully torture Oh Sehun or if he would ruin the experience by finding it sexy. At any rate, she was going to kill him, and it was going to hurt very, very badly.

“I do not want to hear anything,” Minseok’s voice rose steadily into a roar, “About you kissing my baby sister.”

Cowed, Sehun let his arm drop from around Sohee’s shoulders and took a step backwards. Even Sohee quivered a little, though her brother did not scare her in the least. She was just a teensy bit intimidated. She was still going to kill them both, though.

Minseok turned back to her. “Can I just remind you that you dated an actual prince?” he asked. “And now you’re dating him?” He shoved a finger in Sehun’s direction. Sohee looked over at Sehun. He looked terrified and a little crumpled, like a marionette without anything holding up its strings.

Sohee let out a short laugh. “Okay, let’s get one thing straight—Nichkhun is not a prince. You have to make some really big leaps in the lineage to even call him royal. He just tells people that to make himself more impressive!”

Minseok glared at her. “Doesn’t change my question.”

“You dated him?” Sehun asked, forgetting to be intimidated.

Sohee ignored Sehun. “He’s your best friend’s brother!” she yelled at Minseok. “And I can date whoever I want!”

She grabbed Sehun by the wrist and marched out of the room. Her brother was _so_ infuriating, always trying to tell her what to do. He and everyone else saw her as a china doll who belonged inside a glass cabinet, looking pretty and gathering dust. She wasn’t that, didn’t want to be that. And now Minseok was not only determined to keep the sinking trajectory of their business a secret from her, but he also immediately criticized her dating choices, and brought up Nichkhun? As if their mother didn’t do that enough?

It was only when she reached the upstairs hallway leading to her bedroom that Sohee realized she was still dragging Sehun along by the wrist.

“Sorry,” she said, letting go of him. He reeled and balanced himself, rubbing his wrist.

She looked up. He was smiling.

“Don’t you dare,” she said.

He kept smiling. “You _need_ me.” He looked at her with glee.

Sohee couldn’t even say anything. He was right. She needed him to get information out of her brother. Now she needed him to lie for her. Why was she so stupid? Couldn’t she have come up with a better excuse for Sehun’s presence at her house?

“Okay, Oh Sehun, I need you,” she grumbled. “Are you going to help me or what?”

“I’ll help you,” he said. “I wouldn’t miss this for anything.”

Sohee groaned and Sehun grinned down at her. So that was that. Sohee and Sehun were now an item. It sucked.

“I’m coming up there in one minute!” Minseok yelled from down the stairs. “And Sehun you had better not even be _looking_ at her or I will throttle you!”

Sehun shook his head, his smile never leaving his face. “Oh, man. You owe me.”

“Stuff it,” Sohee said.

 

 

* * *

 

Feifei arrived at the office earlier than usual because Syopin Online ate up more and more of her time every day, and she was actually still enrolled in (and, somehow, attending) her graduate classes, and every spare minute of her time had to be filled with keeping the business running. She had less and less time to devote to finding evidence, and as much as she hated to admit it, her run-in with Victoria Song unnerved her. She still intended to complete her mission, but she had to be more careful now, cover her tracks and not appear too suspicious. She had no idea how Victoria knew about her plans, but someone was talking.

Her thoughts preoccupied as she strode quickly through the nearly-empty office, she almost didn’t notice her secretary flagging her down. Her thoughts clicked together slowly—first realizing that her secretary was here, then remembering that her secretary always arrived a half hour before the rest of her staff, and finally recognizing that her secretary wanted her attention. “What is it?” she asked when she’d finally processed the situation. She had too much on her plate.

“Your brother is waiting for you in your office,” the woman said meekly. It occurred to Feifei that maybe her tone of voice hadn’t been all that pleasant.

“Thank you for letting me know,” Feifei told her as kindly as she could. A difficult feat, because she had no interest in talking to her “brother” at any hour, much less before eight in the morning. Gritting her teeth, Feifei went into her office, expecting to see Kris looking up at her with a smarmy smile.

Instead he had his head resting in his hands, hunched over with his elbows on his knees. He barely looked up when she entered the room. “You have to sign off on all this,” he said, gesturing to a stack of files on her desk without lifting his head.

“Bad hangover?” she asked.

Kris just shook his head. That was odd. Feifei set her coffee down on her desk and reached for the files. Since the launch of Syopin Online, many of her old projects had been shuffled over to Kris, for him to prove himself in the same way she’d done. He worked with her old team as well, so she didn’t worry too much about him ruining anything. But she still had to sign off on everything that went through his division before it went into practice.

Kris had apparently just finished going through the files on their trans-Pacific shipping routes, a job Feifei had handled so many times she could complete every stage by rote memory. It involved handling the large number of sub-contracts involved in these routes, allocating the finances to the right places, dealing with different countries’ import and export taxes, and a huge variety of other minutia. Lower-level employees handled each stage, but someone in a senior role needed to oversee the project as a whole. Although Feifei didn’t want Kris anywhere near her inheritance, the business side of her kicked in quickly. It was a good position for Kris to start in as it required him to see the whole of their enterprise from the ground up. When she first started she’d actually insisted on a trip to go see it for herself, starting in the exit port in Hong Kong and talking with the manager of the company they contracted at the shipping docks there, and following a shipment through every stage until it arrived in the US. It was a trip she should encourage Kris to take, too. Would mention it now, if he didn’t look like he was about to vomit on the carpet.

She flipped through the files absently, pondering Kris’s demeanor. It wasn’t like him to be so unguarded and—miserable. Not in front of her, at least. He truly looked ill, and Feifei felt a twinge of pity. She should tell him to take a sick day.

She was about to open her mouth and tell him to go home when one of the numbers caught her eye. She looked at it again, scanning through the page to make sure she was looking at what she thought she was.

“You made a mistake,” she said. She turned the file around and pushed it toward him. “You’re a hundred thousand dollars short on our payment to these contractors.”

While Kris slowly raised himself into a sitting position, Feifei read the paper upside down. She frowned. Kris reached for the file, but Feifei grabbed it first and flipped it back around, looking at the characters printed for the sub-contractor of the shipping port they used in Guangdong.

“This isn’t even the right contract,” she said. She looked up at him. “How on earth did this get screwed up?”

Kris snatched the pages back from her and scowled at them, his eyes moving back and forth as he read. “No, this is right,” he said. He tossed the file back onto the desk.

“No, it’s not,” she shot back. “Think about it—the number of employees they have to have at the dock just to get this shipment loaded? This could not cover their wages. And it’s _not_ the right contractor.”

Kris shot up out of his chair. “It’s the right fucking contractor!” he yelled. He shoved a finger at the files. “I went over this shit a hundred times! It’s right and you know it!”

Feifei gaped at him. He was shaking with rage, but as his rage cooled, he still shook a little. He looked around as though he was not quite certain where he was. His eyes roamed the files again, met hers briefly, and then he slumped back into the chair.

“Kris,” she said carefully, “Don’t take this the wrong way, okay? But—did someone give you something at a party, something hard? You’re not acting normal.”

He glared at her, his brow furrowed, and then he covered his face with his hands. “I’m fine,” he groaned, sounding anything but. “But I know I didn’t do anything wrong on these files. Okay? I am absolutely certain. I went over all the paperwork I got like, a million times.”

Feifei picked up the file again. This one definitely had the wrong contractor, and at _any_ port, the amount allocated would be far too little to compensate the number of employees required for the job.

She picked up another file and flipped through it. Sure enough, anomalies started to appear on this route, too. Different contractors than the ones they’d used for years. Payments changed that were normally only adjusted for the volume of the shipment, the tax rates, and exchange rates.

In the third file she finally found a sign of the change—a contract with the actual shipment company who brought their goods over in boats. A different shipment company than the one Feifei knew and trusted. At the bottom of the page was her father’s signature and seal.

Feifei grew very still.

“Kris,” she said in a low voice, “Did you oversee any of these changes to contracts, or did they all come to you this way?”

He rubbed his fingers into his eyes and shrugged. “You told me not to change any of that. So I didn’t.”

Feifei saw now what this meant. When her father handed her responsibility in the company, he’d limited the kinds of executive decisions he could make simply because it would mean getting into a very public argument with his daughter. That had happened once, at a board meeting—and although Feifei had been publicly scorned for her disrespect, in private nearly everyone in the company had sided with her wisdom, because her father sought to cut corners where they simply couldn’t be cut. Recognizing a seismic shift in the sentiments of his company, her father had been more careful. In the transition from her to Kris, he’d slipped in and made the changes he wanted to.

“You should go home,” she said to Kris. “You don’t look well at all.”

Their eyes met and she had the strangest feeling that he was about to confide in her. He opened his mouth, fear darkening his eyes, but then he closed it again, and stood up. Without another word he left the office and Feifei was left staring at the files he’d brought.

She’d have to research these contractors, but the numbers indicated they underpaid their workers. Feifei was no fool and she knew that many sub-contractors, even the ones she’d worked with for years, could be less than ethical in their hiring practices, promising migrant workers a far better salary and working conditions than what they would really deliver. But she’d stuck with her old sub-contractors because they were always very nearly ethical; she knew the men in charge and never worried about them hiring on crews with what amounted to a slave contract, or doubling up their shipments with human trafficking, things she’d heard whispers about but avoided asking too many questions. These new sub-contractors, with their low payment demands, could be anything.

Feifei rubbed her temples. She could not wait any longer. She could not wait for her father to descend farther into immorality in pursuit of riches. She could not wait for Victoria Song to arrange her murder. She could not wait while the Procurator-General turned a blind eye at his country's decay.

She could not, and would not wait.

 

 

* * *

 

Zitao gasped as he broke the surface of the water and clung onto the platform. He turned around immediately to look at the timer, its red LED pixels glowing fiercely in the harsh light of the swimming center. His family made those, and so it turned out he’d broken his personal record again. The Olympics were within sight. He grinned and inclined his chin at his coach. Coach Li merely gave him a lopsided smirk and scribbled away at his clipboard.

“Shaved two seconds off,” Coach Li tapped his pen on the clipboard as Zitao bobbed up and down near the edge, “but you need to get another two off if you want to get into the Olympics, kid.”

Zitao scowled. “I’m _trying_.”

“Trying is never fucking enough. Why do you think there are so many rejects floating around in Chinese pools?” Coach Li narrowed his eyes at him. Zitao resisted the urge to roll his eyes, and was about to retort something in response when one of the junior collegiate coaches ran up and whispered something in Coach Li’s ear. His face relaxed, and he turned to Zitao. “Your sponsor’s here.”

Zitao quirked an eyebrow as he turned towards the direction of the pool entrance. Kris was walking over in what looked like a bespoke suit, except that he had two buttons undone at the top, which was totally not acceptable in any formal setting, as Zitao had so been taught. But whatever, he thought as he heaved himself out of the pool. Kris was paying him to train, so it didn’t matter if he couldn’t dress respectably.

“What’s up.” Zitao raised a hand in greeting, and Kris stopped in front of him, surveying him with an interested expression. Coach Li immediately half-bowed in greeting. Zitao wanted to laugh at the old man, who was obviously in reverence of the Wang fortune but yet still proud enough to not bow all the way. What a dick.

“I heard you’ve been breaking records.” Kris said and Zitao ran a hand through his wet hair nonchalantly. They walked to the lowest row of seats by the side, where Coach Li busied himself talking about statistics and timings and probabilities of him getting into the Olympic team. The junior coach handed Zitao a bottle of isotonic beverage before scurrying away. Coach Li never liked it when the junior coaches tried to listen in. Zitao swigged a long mouthful. He really was a major dick.

“Thanks, Coach Li. I have something to discuss with Zitao in private, so if you would just let us be for a moment?” Kris nodded somewhat patronisingly at Coach Li, and Zitao watched with amusement as his coach all but crawled out of the way. He finished the bottle as Coach Li exited the pool complex, and it was just him and Kris left.

“He’s pushing you hard.” Kris said casually, like he was making an observation. Zitao snorted.

“You think?” He tossed the bottle upwards and caught it. “We fly back to China for that national competition next week. He’s so taking the chance to possibly work me to death.”

Kris laughed and Zitao frowned. The steroids regime he was on was gradually taking its course, but he wanted results faster. So he’d been pushing as hard as he could, but clearly Coach Li determined that the combined effect of the drugs and his training wasn’t going to be enough just yet. That pissed Zitao off, together with the fact that he’d been a teetotaler for months now and hadn’t seen any of his friends in weeks. Sehun had gone MIA, as had Jia.

“Where’s Jia?” He turned to Kris and asked abruptly. Kris’s expression didn’t change, but Zitao caught something shift in his eyes. “I haven’t seen her in such a fucking long time.”

“In school. Where else could she be?” Kris said smoothly, and Zitao rolled his eyes. “I’m not here to talk about her. Coach Li and I have been talking about getting you on a new regime cycle.”

Zitao stared at him. “But this one’s working.”

“Not quickly enough.” Kris replied briskly. “You said it yourself, you have a competition next week. We know you’re good enough to win that one, but what about the regionals next month? It’s you against the rest of Asia.”

“You cannot possibly be asking me to switch _now_.” Zitao said incredulously. This was insane. “The first thing I have to do when I get off that plane is go straight to doping.”

Kris gave him a look. “Don’t be stupid. I’m saying that we’re going to switch you out after next week.”

An insult rose in Zitao’s throat but he clamped it down. Kris wasn’t wrong, and he was merely offering what he’d been thinking of just before. There was no reason to turn him down. But as Zitao sat, still sopping wet in his jammers, and listened to Kris go on about the advantages of the new drug, it all seemed a little ridiculous to him. Then he realised that he already was on a monthly cycle of injecting himself with a serum to heighten his swim performance. Zitao wanted to laugh at that.

“You’ll be fine,” Kris had apparently finished extolling the benefits of the new steroid regime, and now had a hand on his shoulder, “we’re counting on you for our new image, future Olympian.”

Zitao tried not to make a face, and ended up frowning at the floor instead. Kris rambled on a bit more about how his entry into the Olympic team would help promote their company image as socially responsible for talent development, and how he would be perfect because he was talented. It all sounded a bit ironic, really, but Zitao listened without a word. Kris talked until he picked up a call and had to leave, and Zitao watched him go without too much regret. He stared at the empty bottle and wondered how vodka would taste like right now. He’d almost forgotten the taste of it, after too many months of almost-habitual abstinence.

He sat on the empty row of seats for a while more, before slowly making his way into the locker rooms. His phone only showed notifications of messages from his mom, and Zitao wondered what he was even waiting for. His life was consumed with the single thought of making it into the Olympics, and his friends had so helpfully cooperated by completely disappearing. He threw his phone back into his backpack, and stepped into an empty shower cubicle. When Zitao was done showering and slouched out with his backpack slung over a shoulder, he stopped in his tracks to find Sehun standing on an empty seat and waving his arms.

“What,” he began and Sehun put down his arms with a huge grin, “the fuck are you doing?”

“Dude, I’m just excited.” Sehun leapt over the railings and landed with a huge thump in front of him. They were about as tall as each other, Zitao unkindly noted, and it pissed him off that he couldn’t stare Sehun down. “Where have you been?”

Zitao stared at him for a moment, before heaving his backpack onto his other shoulder. “Here. Training. Where the fuck else would I be?”

Sehun looked like he’d said something completely redundant. Zitao wanted to turn on his heel and leave, but it was the first time in god knew how long that he’d seen his best friend. Jia too, but he wouldn’t count on her to turn up now. So he stayed and stared at the beige floor tiles instead.

“I’ve been calling you but all I get is your voicemail, man.” Sehun said, his arm gestures animated. “I had to bribe ten people before they would tell me where you were training.”

“Oh?” Zitao continued surveying the ground. “You’re experienced at that, so whatever.”

“The fuck, Zitao?” Sehun stepped forward, and Zitao moved back immediately. He remembered now that he’d blocked both Sehun and Jia’s numbers a while ago. So that was why he wasn’t receiving any messages or calls from them, but Zitao wasn’t going to tell them that in their faces. So he glared at Sehun with a stony face, while Sehun looked utterly confused. “What’s going on?”

“You would know if you were actually around.” Zitao spat back before he could stop himself. Sehun looked like he’d been struck in the face. “Why are _you_ here?”

“Because you wouldn’t fucking pick up my calls?” Sehun shot back. Zitao didn’t have a good comeback to that, so he shifted his weight around and tried to pretend that if he wished hard enough, Sehun would go away. But he didn’t. “Dude, look. I know you’ve been busy and shit, but I’ve tried to get to you. And none of your coaches would tell me where you were training, so I had to work my wiles on that junior female coach, and even then did you know how hard it was to actually get here?”

Zitao rolled his eyes, but Sehun persevered. “Whatever it is, I just wanted to ask you out for dinner.”

“You drove all the way out here to ask me for dinner.” Zitao repeated, deadpan. Sehun nodded. “I don’t think so.”

"Ok, be pissy all you want, but can we just go for dinner?" Sehun narrowed his eyes at him. Zitao shifted his glance to Sehun's jacket instead. He tried to recall a brand name, but couldn't. Whatever, he thought, it wasn't like Sehun actually picked out the clothes he wore anyway. "I have someone I want you to meet."

"Who?" Zitao asked in spite of himself. Sehun was grinning even more widely now, and wiggled his eyebrows at him.

"You'll see when you get there." He reached for his shoulder, and for a moment Zitao felt like everything was back to normal. When Sehun and Jia were always just a phone call away, when his biggest worry was deciding what dumbass luxury item to splurge on for the day, and when he didn't have to think about the consequences of doping himself up to win a competition he didn't even know if he wanted to anymore. Sehun's fingers brushed against his college swim team t-shirt, and Zitao reflexively moved away. When he looked up Sehun was staring at him, stunned.

Something rose within him, and the words tumbled out of Zitao before he could stop himself: "Why do you think everything will be fucking a-ok once you deign to stop and remember about me?"

"What?" Sehun now paused and blinked very slowly at him.

"Don't you find it fucking hilarious that for weeks you've forgotten about my existence, and now that you want me to do something, I suddenly exist again?" Zitao laughed, and the short, barking sound echoed through the empty pool complex. "You're fucking ace, Oh Sehun."

"Do you even hear what you're saying right now?" Sehun advanced towards him. Zitao stood his ground. "I'm not the one who's been sending calls straight to fucking voicemail."

Zitao glared at him very hard, but Sehun didn't back off. "I'm fucking tired from ten hours of training, I don't have time for your bullshit." He said and shoved Sehun in the shoulder. He didn’t even budge.

“What is your problem?” Sehun didn’t even bother with expletives this time. He stared at Zitao, who was sure that he didn’t want to be in the same space as Sehun right now. It suffocated him, knowing that he and Jia were elsewhere, doing something that they probably enjoyed more than him trying to plow through records and shorten timings. Zitao realised now, that he was actively hating the sport for the first time ever since he’d picked it up.

“ _You_.” He snarled, and pushed him away hard enough this time that Sehun stumbled. Zitao didn’t look back, even as Sehun shouted his way, and walked very quickly to where his Maserati was. He unlocked the doors and flicked the locks shut as soon as he’d climbed in. Sehun was charging towards where he was, but he started the car and pulled out of the lot without daring to stop.

All he could see of Sehun in the rear mirror as the car got further and further away was just him, standing in the middle of an empty parking space in the vicious sun, strangely still.

 

 

* * *

 

Jia walked into the campus health center with her eyes trained directly ahead of her, wary of looking anyone in the eye. The lobby was mostly empty, though, and the secretary at the desk smiled pleasantly when she handed over the registration form. Jia took the clipboard and sat down in a chair, glancing between a young guy with a nasty cough and a girl who looked like she was about to puke at any moment. Then she turned to the form. It had been nearly four days since she told Kris, and she hadn’t heard from him since then. Not that she expected to, but still.

She filled out her name and other information and then looked at each of the boxes on the form until she found one that said “Counseling” and another that said “Physical Exam.” She didn’t really want to write “Pregnancy” on the form, or even be here at all, but she would be in America for the next few months and if she really was going to go through with things, she wanted to see a doctor. In the end, she left those two boxes checked and didn’t bother specifying, then returned the clipboard to the front desk and sat down to wait.

After a good twenty minutes of staring at the painting of a beach on the opposite wall, Jia was finally called back to an exam room. There she waited for another few minutes until the doctor walked in, a woman with frizzy red curls and a flushed, but kind face.

The woman introduced herself as Doctor Carrie and then she said, “What brings you in here today?” She wore a bright and expectant smile, and spoke with practiced concern. Jia gripped her knees and attempted a weak smile in return.

“I’m pregnant,” she said, her voice softer and less confident than she would have liked. Doctor Carrie gave her one large nod of her head and looked at the form.

“That explains the ‘counseling’ box, then.” She smiled again and Jia tried to figure out how the doctor would expect her to respond, but she didn’t have a clue. That was part of the problem of being an international student—never quite knowing if her responses were what people expected, but attempting to give the right response just so that she could blend in. Then again, there might not _be_ a right response for a foreign undergraduate student to have when she was sitting in her school clinic, admitting her pregnancy. Jia chewed the inside of her cheek for a moment while the doctor handed her a cup and patiently explained the steps they would take for another pregnancy test.

Jia did everything the doctor asked on autopilot. She spent a good amount of time afterward sitting in the examination room, thinking of very little. Just waiting. Unconsciously she kept wringing her hands, and then she’d wrap her arms around herself again and wait.

The doctor came back into the room. “You are pregnant, dear,” she said. She pulled up a chair. “You have several options.”

Jia listened as the doctor explained these, stopping to make sure Jia understood each choice she listed and all the medical terminology as well. Jia wondered if Doctor Carrie had gone through this with other international students. What they ended up choosing. What she wanted to choose. What did she want? All those options and it was her own choice to make. In the end it wasn’t up to Kris, because he likely would not be able to embrace his role as a father. If that was what Jia chose.

“You do not have to continue this pregnancy,” Doctor Carrie finished firmly, looking Jia directly in the eyes with a piercing, serious stare.

Jia looked at her hands. She could go back to normal life if she wanted to. Return to her bright plans of continuing on with the Wang Corporation, spring boarding her career. She’d be able to send so much money to her parents. Live happily. Live without worries.

If she had a baby, her life would become very difficult. In China, children without fathers could not be registered. They could not attend public school. Her child would live a ghost-like existence. Jia’s visa did extend through the rest of the year, so she could get the child American citizenship before returning to China, if she wanted. Even so, it would be very difficult, raising a child as a single mother in China. Her parents would be disappointed, but Jia was certain they would never turn her away. Her extended family and her parents’ friends would be far less kind. Her child would grow up hearing comments about being a bastard, and worse names. Jia would have to work very hard to make sure her child never doubted her love.

She looked back up. Without realizing it, she’d made her decision. Her stupid, foolish, absurd decision. And yet she felt calm.

“I want to continue with it,” she said. Her voice was strong and clear. “I want to.”

Jia steeled herself for the doctor’s opposition, but Doctor Carrie only looked at her for a moment before nodding and looking back at the file in her hands.

“We can’t offer you pregnancy care here,” she said, “But I can refer you to another doctor who will take your insurance.”

Jia nodded and listened as the doctor made lots of notes for her, instructing her to make an appointment in a few weeks and to be sure to get plenty of rest. Jia felt warm and at peace. Scared, too. But as rocky and troubling as the path ahead of her was, Jia knew this was what she wanted.

“Good luck,” Doctor Carrie told her with a small smile. Jia didn’t think she was imagining the doubt on the doctor’s face, but she would have to get used to that. She was choosing the foolish thing. She couldn’t expect anyone to understand why she would embrace such an inconvenient motherhood, but no one else was living her life, and she trusted her own intuition over everyone else’s skepticism.

She left the clinic with a handful of papers and the phone number of a doctor’s office. Walking slowly across campus, she soaked in the warm afternoon, the sounds of students chattering as they crossed the campus. Two months and her degree would be complete. She would graduate and either go home, or find a way to stay in this country until the baby was born and then go home. Either way, having her plans determined, her road picked out, strengthened her. She felt alive again.

Jia reached her car and got inside. It was warm and quiet. She leaned her head back against the seat and took a deep breath, pressing her hand against her flat stomach.

“It’s you and me, kiddo,” she said into the silence. And then she laughed at her herself—a real laugh, bubbling out from her. Inexplicably, she was happy.

 

 

* * *

 

Sohee leaned against the door of Sehun’s apartment and tried not to roll her eyes as he stood in front of her, arms crossed and refusing to move.

“Do we _have_ to go?” Sehun said and she nodded. “It’s not like he’s going to provide you with anything useful.”

“And you know that because?” She raised an eyebrow.

“All you have to do is wait for hyung to get back to me.” Sehun said as he uncrossed his arms and leaned forward towards her. She swatted his head away, and he yelped in mock pain. “Seeing how we’re dating for that.”

Sohee scowled and hit him again. “We’re _not_.” Sehun pouted down at her and she lifted a threatening arm. He shied away almost immediately. “Are you coming or not?”

Chanyeol lived in the neighbouring block, three floors above Sehun’s, and the very exclusive nature of their complex dictated that they had to either declare themselves as visitors, or actually be residents. Sohee wasn’t going to lose the element of surprise like she had the other time, so she really needed Sehun’s fingerprint to get past the security system. But he wasn’t cooperating very well.

“You should be nicer to the person you’re asking a favour from,” Sehun groused and reached for a pair of Nikes. Sohee waited as he put them on, and then stepped out into the hallway. Sehun let the door slam behind them, before staring at her for a very brief moment, and then grabbing her hand.

“What are you doing?” Sohee asked very levelly as he clutched her right hand tighter.

“Your hand for my fingerprint.” Sehun winked at her as the elevator doors slid open, and Sohee had to concede he had a point, no matter how much she wanted to deny it. So they held hands all the way until the connecting skybridge between the two buildings, and Sohee wanted to ask if he was done holding her hand, but he obviously wasn’t. Sehun walked on very happily in front as they crossed over to the other side, and Sohee followed behind reluctantly.

The doors leading to Chanyeol’s building buzzed open as Sehun scanned his thumbprint in, and he gestured for her to enter first with a flourish. Sohee glared at him, then at their intertwined hands.

“Are you really going to burn your bridges right now?” Sehun’s tone made her want to lunge for his throat, but again he was the one who really had the upper hand here. So Sohee pulled, and he stumbled behind her this time as they made their way to Chanyeol’s apartment. His unit was in the opposite direction of Sehun’s, and according to Sehun’s running commentary in the elevator, “the lousier one”.

Sehun rang the doorbell only because Sohee made him. Again, she wasn’t too keen on Chanyeol knowing beforehand that she was here. The threat of Minseok, as evidenced by the way Sehun had behaved after meeting him the other day, was still too great to be ignored.

“This is Mr. Park’s residence, who is this speaking?” The voice over the intercom was clipped and exceedingly polite.

“Oh Sehun.” Sehun reached over to articulate every syllable too clearly, and Sohee hit him on the shoulder again. Why was he being so embarrassing? Chanyeol’s butler had, however, registered his name with the image that appeared in the digital peephole (Sohee had wisely stepped out of frame), and the door soon popped open with a loud click. Sehun smirked at her, pulled the door open, and gestured her to go in first. Sohee didn’t know if she wanted to flip him off or not.

The butler was already waiting for them at the end of the hallway, and hardly raised an eyebrow when he saw Sohee. Sehun’s reputation for indiscriminate sleeping around was now helping, but Sohee was feeling strangely unhappy about it. But she didn’t have time for such petty feelings, and let Sehun prop her up as she removed her heels. Even in the States all of them took their shoes off at home. It was one of the many things that their families did to maintain the facade of being a cultured chaebol house.

“Sehun? What are you doi— _Sohee_?” Chanyeol’s voice rounded the corner before he did, and he froze as soon as he made eye contact with Sohee, who was still struggling with her Ferragamos. Sehun had his arm wrapped around her waist, and it must have all been very scandalous, because Chanyeol looked petrified.

“Hi hyung.” Sehun seemed to be the only one enjoying all of this. “We came to visit.”

“ _We_?” Chanyeol repeated robotically.

“We.” Sehun grinned and Sohee resisted the urge to club him with her heels. “Do you have tea?”

Chanyeol gave him a weird look, and Sohee let out a very slow, deep breath as the butler led the way to the sitting room. There was a girl in there who looked extremely frazzled as she typed away frantically at her glowing MacBook. Sohee didn’t know her name but sort of recognised her somewhere from school. She looked up crossly, and frowned for a moment at them.

“Wait,” she said suddenly, “aren’t you Jia’s friend?”

“Who’s Jia?” Chanyeol asked and the girl ignored him. Sehun pointed to himself, slightly amused, and Sohee gave him a very noticeable sidewards glance.

“Yeah. You’re her roommate, right?” Sehun plopped himself down on the sofa and made himself at home. Sohee, however, had some semblance of manners, and sat down with her legs properly crossed. Chanyeol had slid down onto the floor beside the girl, expression still confused. “Hye… you don’t want to hear me try.”

“Yeah that’s you alright. The one slightly kooky in the head. And it’s Hyerim.” Hyerim raised her eyebrows and gave him a look. Sehun’s eyes widened and Sohee wanted to laugh. “Jia talks about how funny you are all the time. She appreciates her toilet humour.”

“Seriously, who is Ji—” Chanyeol began again, but Sohee cut him off quickly.

“Kris’s girlfriend. You met her at Lu Han’s party and you can’t remember her name?” Sohee said a little incredulously and Chanyeol seemed to shrink a little into himself. “Baekhyun caused such a scene, I thought it’d be memorable enough for you, at least.”

“I’m bad with names.” He offered, and Hyerim and Sohee rolled their eyes in unison.

“Oh, not when he has three hours to study for a midterm and desperately needs notes.” Hyerim turned around and informed her. “He has your name, your number, _and_ your face down pat.”

Chanyeol’s ears turned very red, and Sohee coughed to suppress a laugh. Sehun had no inhibitions, though, and rolled around on the couch guffawing. Hyerim rolled her eyes again and went back to typing. She looked like she was so focused that they could hardly exist, these children of the richest families back in the motherland, and Sohee appreciated it. Liked the girl, even.

“Chanyeol.” She said and he looked up at her. “We need to talk.”

“We.” Sehun sat up and gestured to the both of them. Sohee closed her eyes and regulated her breathing. Chanyeol’s eyes darted between them for a moment, before Hyerim raised her hand without looking away from her screen and motioned for him to go. Sohee liked her even more now. He paused briefly and made a face behind her back. Hyerim’s hand landed very accurately and loudly on his shoulder. Sohee’s liking of her shot right through the roof.

“Are you—” Chanyeol hedged as he led them towards his study. Sohee was even surprised he had one, given how inclined he was towards partying. He was one of a few regular fixtures at Minseok’s parties—the others included Sehun (she frowned a little) and Baekhyun (who she was sure never wanted to see her brother’s face ever again). Sohee inclined her head in answer.

He deflated, and Sehun made a sound that Sohee was sure to be a muffled laugh. “Never mind, I don’t want to know.”

“We’re dating.” Sehun blurted out, and Sohee once again internally cursed herself for thinking up such a stupid cover story. Sehun’s intensely competitive and childish side seemed to be out in full force against Chanyeol, even as he opened the door and let them in, expression an amalgamation of bewilderment and annoyance. “Yes, hyung. We’re dating.”

“I said I didn’t want to know.” Chanyeol snapped, and shut the door. “What do you want?”

“Shut up.” Sohee hissed in Sehun’s ear, and he merely mimed zipping his mouth shut while pulling on her right pinky. She shook it out of his grasp and went up to Chanyeol, who was leaning against his door and still looking very confused. “I need to know what you wanted to tell me that day, at Lu Han’s party.”

Chanyeol’s left eye twitched. She knew that he had something to hide, obviously under pressure from Minseok, but Sohee had him cornered in his own study now. And if she needed any help, Sehun was at least tall enough to be intimidating. Sohee didn’t want to consider the fact that Chanyeol was taller still. She needed answers, and he was going to give them to her.

“Do you happen to know what kind of person Minseok hyung is to anyone that is not you?” Chanyeol said slowly, and she could see Sehun nodding out of the corner of her eye. “He said expressly to shut it.”

“And I say expressly to open your mouth and tell me everything.” Sohee didn’t think she could hate Minseok more than ever now. Chanyeol glanced at her, then at Sehun, then somewhere behind Sehun that seemed to be his drafty white curtains. He was wavering, a little, and all he needed was a bit of encouragement. “I’m not going to say it was you.”

Chanyeol froze for a full minute, before throwing his arms up in the air.

“Ah, fuck it.” He strode over to his desk and pulled out a notepad. Sehun had moved to make some space for her on the leather swivel chair he was sitting on, and Sohee gave him a very severe look.

“I’m not going to half-sit on your lap.” She said, and Sehun clucked his tongue at her. But he did give up the chair to her, and pushed himself up on the enormous desk instead. Sohee watched as Chanyeol pulled a Mont Blanc out of a top drawer, and flipped the cap off.

“First, I want Sehun to promise me at least some protection from Minseok hyung if he ever does come for my life.” Chanyeol glared at Sehun, who shrugged and mouthed a why. “Because Segyun hyung is dating Chorong nuna, who also happens to be _my_ cousin? If you think you’re going to leave a future in-law for dead, you are wrong.”

“I’ll give you hyung’s number.” Sehun laughed, and Chanyeol scowled before flipping him the finger.

“Can we please get to it?” Sohee pushed Sehun’s face away, and asked. Chanyeol cleared his throat and began writing on the notepad. A huge “Wang” appeared etched in the middle of the sheet.

“I think this is self-explanatory,” Chanyeol looked up at her, and she nodded silently, “but anyway, they’re the core of everything. You know that online mall we have shares in? Our family invested in food, our main sector, and the fashion side of things as well. Chorong nuna handled that. You’d think that with double the investment, we’d get more shares. But as it turned out,” he circled everything that he had written about the Park investments and crossed them out, “we didn’t.”

“Your family didn’t invest the most,” Sohee pointed out. She had managed to sneak a few looks at the online mall accounts, and the cosmetics section had the most amount of cash flowing in. “The Jungs and the Byuns did.”

“Precisely.” Chanyeol pointed the fountain pen at her and nodded. “And if you were in the loop, you would have heard of how valiantly the Wangs strove to keep things equal between the two. All I can say is, Wang Feifei must have had a real hard time, because Baekhyun and Jessica nuna like eating people whole for breakfast.”

“So?” Sohee didn’t get it. Ruthlessness was a quality treasured in a talented businessperson, and her brother demonstrated that in spades. She had heard about their global GM’s inability to hold a conversation with Minseok without looking elsewhere. “That’s not uncommon.”

“He means that things were obviously not what they seemed on the surface.” Sehun said from the side, fiddling with an intricately carved paperweight in the shape of a tortoise. Chanyeol grabbed it from him and set it back down. “The Byuns and the Jungs didn’t receive equal shares.”

Sohee stared at him for a moment, a little impressed. Then Sehun quirked an eyebrow, and the moment was broken. She turned back to Chanyeol, who was scribbling furiously again. The sheet of paper now had Baekhyun and Jessica’s names on it.

“We know this because our family has a source in the form of my mom’s aunt. Who’s Baekhyun’s grand-aunt-in-law, I don’t know, these familial relations are complicated. But whatever it is, the Byuns paid for it.” Chanyeol put the pen down. “They paid to make it seem like they were receiving the same of everything that the Jungs did, while, you know, not actually doing that.”

“They bribed the Wangs?” Sohee narrowed her eyes. “What for?”

“The Chinese market.” Sehun spoke up again. He was now playing with the light switch of the Oxford lamp on the desk, and Chanyeol reached over to swipe his hand off it. “The U.S. is just a litmus test. Why else do you think they picked L.A.? Chinese hotspot. Once you have a following somewhere, it’s always easier to export. Where else better than to the biggest one in the world?”

“So why not straight to China itself?” Sohee pointed out. It didn’t connect in her mind, which was whirring hard. “Why invest in this online mall at all?”

“The Byuns and the Jungs have a traditional stronghold in the U.S., so why go all the way out when you can be on homeground _and_ still deliver your products to the target audience? China’s not that easy to break into.” Sehun said, nodding down at her. Sohee narrowed her eyes at him in curiosity. Opposite them Chanyeol was gaping slightly.

“You’re very knowledgeable.” Sohee raised an eyebrow. She meant it, though.

Sehun paused for a moment, as if to digest the meaning behind her tone. “Well,” he looked up at the ceiling, covered with an ornate, almost indiscernible repeating motif, “we’ve gone through a lot of shit in China. Or so hyung says.”

“Whatever it is,” Chanyeol continued, “the Byuns are not… clean. Your family has the records, your brother should know. If he’s not going to tell anyone about it, then I think we should all follow his lead.”

“Coward.” Sehun whistled under his breath, and Sohee watched as Chanyeol’s ears turned red again. She agreed, though. Why did Minseok have to dictate everything that they did? Sohee snorted and Chanyeol paused, before he tore up the sheet of paper that was covered in writing.

“You don’t have to tell anyone,” she informed him, “I’ll do that.”

“Are you crazy?” Chanyeol blubbered. “There has to be way more people involved in this than we already know. What if they all come out of the woodwork at once? How are you going to handle that?”

“With you all the way, Sohee.” Sehun patted her on the shoulder and jumped off the table. Chanyeol scowled at him. “The power of the Ohs lies squarely behind you.”

“Come fucking on, Sehun.” Chanyeol glared at him and Sehun pulled a face. “This has nothing to do with being a coward. Nobody goes into business without having comrades. Our family is too big for me not to worry, you asshole.”

Chanyeol’s family _was_ huge. Sohee remembered that his generations of Parks included Chorong, who was Segyun’s long-term girlfriend and in charge of their fashion arm, and Minseul, Do Kyungsoo’s fiancee and whose family branch was in cars. Their reach was much wider than either her or Sehun’s families, which were mainly concentrated in one area, so Sohee understood Chanyeol’s reservations. But it didn’t mean she was going to be daunted.

“If your family’s clean, then your worries are completely unfounded.” Sehun said simply, and Chanyeol kept his silence. It was exactly what Sohee wanted to say, except more blunt and unforgiving. Sehun didn’t seem to have any inhibitions, but he was saying the right things. “Don’t fret, hyung.”

“Easy for you to say.” Chanyeol stood up, towering over her. “But all you have now at this point is speculation. If you really want to spread this out, you’ll need more than just my word.”

Sohee thought over that as they made their way back to the sitting room. Chanyeol had made it clear that he needed to finish his project, which was due in two days. It was a polite enough way of chasing them out. When they rounded back to the sitting room again, Hyerim was still there, typing away, while a newcomer looked up from the notes he was reading.

“Thank you for gracing us with your presence, Jinho.” Chanyeol snarked, and flopped himself on the floor beside him. Sohee recognised him as Cho Jinho, youngest son of the Cho electronics family. They were the same age, and while they didn’t socialise very often with each other because Jinho yo-yoed between Seoul and L.A. frequently, she liked him well enough. His family was one of the biggest among the _chaebols_ , and that meant having more self control than the rest. Jinho waved at her, and she waved back.

“You should listen to yourself, saying that to someone who just came off a flight from Seoul.” Jinho punched him in the shoulder and Chanyeol groaned. “Leaving already, Sohee? Hi, Sehun.”

Sehun waved lazily. “Hi Jinho hyung. And yeah, we’re leaving.” He made sure to emphasise extra hard on the _we_ , and Sohee had to urge herself not to roll her eyes. Jinho was taken slightly aback, but recovered quickly enough. Yeah, clearly everyone was reacting the way that Minseok had predicted they would, but Sohee was far beyond the point of caring anymore.

“Hey, Jia’s friend, before you go, have you seen her around lately?” Hyerim looked up from her MacBook, and Sehun stared at her. “I mean, she hangs out with you and the other Chinese dude the most, so I thought you’d know. She hasn’t been home a whole deal nowadays.”

Sehun’s face set in an smooth, expressionless mask for a very brief moment, before he shook his head and laughed a little. “Nope. Haven’t seen Jia around in a long time.” Sohee noted curiously that he had neglected to mention anything about Zitao. She thought they were best friends, but then again it wasn’t any of her business.

Chanyeol called for his butler, who appeared quickly to show them out. Sohee wanted to say something, anything, to him, but as she walked out, she realised that she didn’t know what to. This was steadily becoming something much bigger that she’d thought it would be. Minseok was hiding something of gargantuan proportions, and while Chanyeol had provided something for her to work with, Sohee had an inkling that it was only a piece of the puzzle that she had to put together.

“Hey,” Sehun pulled on her hand as the door closed behind them, and she turned around, slightly lost for a moment, “you’ll be fine. We’ll get through this together.”

Sohee stared at their hands, clasped together again, and this time she didn’t mind it too much.

 

 

* * *

 

After her appointment, Jia drove to a nearby grocery store. Her pantry was nearly empty, since she’d been too distracted the whole week to remember to feed herself properly. Now she needed to reorient herself to her life, eat well and eat plenty, keep her health strong.

Inside she gathered as many vegetables as she thought she could eat in a week and then started looking around for anything else that seemed healthy and not full of sugar. She was trying in vain to reach a container of oatmeal on the top shelf when she heard someone call her name.

She turned to see Zhang Yixing coming down the aisle toward her, the slightest frown on his face. He reached up above her and picked up the oatmeal container, handing it to her without seeming entirely aware of what he was doing. “I haven’t seen you in ages,” he said. “I hope everything’s okay.”

She set the oatmeal into her cart. She couldn’t deny to herself how happy she was to see him. He’d been such a reliable friend these last few months, always willing to listen to her, always _present_. “I’m sorry,” she told him, smiling apologetically. “I’ve been so busy. I’m really sorry.”

“Don’t worry,” he said, holding up a hand and shaking his head. “It’s fine. You don’t need to apologize.”

“How are you?” she asked.

He answered something about classes and his friends’ issues, but Jia had a hard time focusing on his words. Zhang Yixing. He acted like he had a crush on her; Jia wasn’t stupid. He was a little odd, though, so he might not—but she was fairly certain he did. And here she was, knocked up, maybe-probably leading him on. She knew what sort of girl someone like Yixing was supposed to end up with—someone wealthy, lovely, virginal. That’s what was expected of him and for him, and anything less would soil his reputation. Guys like Kris could get away with screwing around with girls like Jia, because he was expected to have a little fun before a proper marriage. She’d figured this out in the last few months, piecing together off-handed comments and, when they were still talking, probing Zitao for explanations when anyone looked at her askance. It had bothered her, a little, but she ignored it. At any rate, if Yixing knew Jia was pregnant, his crush would flicker out quickly. That was probably the kind thing for her to do.

“Jia?”

She shook herself and realized that he’d asked her a question. “Sorry, what?” She laughed, embarrassed. “I can’t focus.”

He looked concerned all over again, but he repeated his question. “Are you having a dinner party?” He gestured to her cart and Jia realized that maybe she’d overdone it a bit on the vegetables, since she had bags full of leafy greens and a full sack of potatoes which could feed a family of five for a week, rather than just Jia.

“Oh,” she said, looking at the cart. “They cook down, you know?”

She looked back up and he was grinning at her. Then he laughed at her, and Jia shoved his shoulder.

“Let a girl eat, okay?” she laughed. They went through the rest of the grocery store together, Yixing throwing a total of three things into his basket—beer, ramen, and eggs—while Jia gave it a scathing look.

“I can cook more than this,” he insisted. “But Lu Han can’t, and the cook has a vacation next week, and I’m hoping that if there’s food he knows how to cook in the house he’ll actually eat.”

There were so many different things in that statement that Jia didn’t know how to react to, so she settled for just looking skeptical, while Yixing protested that his cooking skills were _great_ and he spent the rest of the time shopping giving her an incredibly detailed description of how to make Kung Pao Chicken.

Standing in line behind Yixing, Jia sobered up a bit. Yixing was a good friend. Easy to talk to. So, so kind. She trusted him more than she trusted a lot of people—even Feifei, who she loved dearly, but led a life Jia couldn’t fathom. Yixing’s life she understood. Though he was wealthy, his upbringing hadn’t been altogether different from hers, and he didn’t seem to live with the constant sense of competition that the others did. But nevertheless. It was unfair to him, really, if she kept encouraging his crush. It had been unfair all along, but she needed a friend so badly she’d ignored the way his eyes lit up when he saw her and lingered a little too long when she walked away. Now, though, she was strong enough to be by herself, or she was going to try. And she should be as kind to him as he was to her.

She pondered how to tell him as they went out to her car and he wordlessly lifted all her grocery bags into her trunk. Ending this friendship made her much more sad than she could have predicted. But it was for the best, for him to know the truth. She would disappear from his circles as soon as school ended and he could forget her and be happy. But she didn’t know how to tell him.

When he straightened up and closed the trunk of her car, she knew she had to say _something_. “Want to hear a secret?” she blurted.

He looked at her, his brow furrowed, and pushed the cart away from them. “Okay?” He sounded worried. Jia felt like all of her insides were shaking to pieces.

He was watching her. She had to say something. Say something now.

“I’m knocked up,” she said, giggling a little at the end. “Seriously.”

He went on staring at her and didn’t say anything. Her whole body shook worse and she knew she would fall into a million pieces but this was the first trial. She would get through this one and she would be okay and she would move on and she would be okay. She would be.

Jia raked a hand back through her hair and attempted a smile. “I’m about a month along,” she said as casually as she could. She didn’t sound casual at all. Yixing had no expression except a slightly open mouth. Jia cleared her throat. “Kris—Kris told me not to go through with it. But Kris doesn’t get to decide, you know? I get to decide. It’s my kid.”

Yixing ran his hand over his hair and looked around wildly while Jia’s heart pounded hard in her chest. Now he knew the truth. Surely he was disappointed, maybe even a little disgusted. Jia remembered the girls who got pregnant too young, the whispers traded by mothers while the girl quietly disappeared for a while. Now Jia was one of them and she realized that the shame was only felt in the disappointment of other people, when they looked at her and wondered why she hadn’t had more self-control. Alone, she was okay. She was glad she’d gotten this over with now.

Yixing finally looked at her again. She couldn’t read his expression, though, and waited for him to say something.

“What do you need?” he asked.

Jia blinked. She mentally backed up and repeated his words in her head and still couldn’t figure out what he meant by them. “What?”

He looked about as confused as she felt. “I mean, you know,” he said, gesturing in the air. “Have you seen a doctor? Do you need help finding one? Do you need someone to run errands for you? Are you going to be able to keep going to classes? You don’t have to stay in bed, do you?” His face scrunched up a little like he was confused. “I’m realizing that I don’t actually have any idea how pregnancy really works.”

Jia didn’t know what to say. Again, Yixing had proven himself to be strange. “Um,” she got out, still a little light-headed with nerves. “I’m fine. I’m taking care of everything. And you won’t even be able to tell for months. I’ll be graduated and everyone will have gone home before I even start to look pregnant.”

Yixing nodded, looking very serious, and Jia wondered what he was thinking. She’d expected the first words out of his mouth to be something along the lines of _wow, Jia, how did you let this happen?_ instead of offering to run errands, so she clearly didn’t have a good grasp of how his brain worked.

“Well,” he said, meeting her eyes again, “You have my number. Call me if you need anything. Seriously. Even if it’s four in the morning and you’re just bored. I don’t care.”

“I’m not going to call you at four in the morning because I’m _bored,_ ” Jia laughed, but Yixing didn’t.

“You can,” he said. “I don’t care.”

“If it was four in the morning and I woke you up you would definitely care.”

“Well,” Yixing said, “Maybe for the first minute or two. But once I woke up it would be okay.”

Jia rolled her eyes. She knew she wasn’t going to call him, maybe ever again. It would probably hurt his feelings, but he needed the clean break. Even if he wasn’t dissuaded by learning her secret, he would be later, and he would wisely distance himself from her. If he didn’t, Jia should help him along. She dug around in her purse for her keys.

She was surprised when he touched her, his hand resting firmly on her shoulder. She looked up and found him more somber than she’d ever seen him.

“We agreed to be friends, right?” he asked. “Months ago. And, I know you—you might not need _me_ around, and that’s okay. But if you do need anything. I’ll do anything.” He blinked, looking a little like he was surprised by his own words.

“Yixing,” she sighed, wondering what she had done to encourage a crush like this. Maybe he just didn’t live in the reasonable world.

“I’m not asking for anything from you,” he said. “I just want to help.”

Jia looked at him. He seemed so earnest and sincere that she felt sorry for him, and felt sorry that she’d brought him to this place where he liked her well enough to keep acting this way even when his chance with her was shot. But he was so kind, and lately Jia didn’t have enough kind people in her life.

She leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. At least she could give him that much.

“Just don’t tell anyone, okay?” she said, trying to sound like she was joking. “That’s all I need. I promise.”

She turned away and got into her car before he could say anything else. If he kept talking, she’d probably let him help her as much as he wanted to, and where would that get them? Probably nowhere.

She backed up the car and gave him a little wave before she pulled away. But his sorrowful eyes as he waved goodbye lingered in her mind for a long time.

 

 

* * *

 

Yixing watched Jia drive away.

Then he walked back into the grocery store and bought a pack of little cigars, even though he hadn’t smoked in ages and it was hypocritical after the lectures he’d been giving Lu Han.

But Lu Han had left a lighter in Yixing’s car, and Yixing had stashed it in the glove compartment, trying to remember to give it back to Lu Han but always too preoccupied by other thoughts to do so. Now he went to his car and fished it out, stuck it in his pocket, and walked aimlessly until he came to a small park. It was empty except for a guy throwing a frisbee to his dog and a couple flying a kite, so Yixing sat down at a rickety picnic table and lit up one of the cigars. He felt steadier with the first inhale, but the cigar did little else to take the edge off his surging emotions.

No use denying it now. He had a lot of very inconvenient feelings about Jia. He’d been trying to ignore them, but, fuck it. He was—as one of his ex-girlfriends had put it when breaking up with him—a “hopeless romantic” and “a fool in love.” She hadn’t meant it kindly.

He’d always _noticed_ Jia. They’d started school the same year, even though it turned out he was a year younger. He remembered because there weren’t that many Chinese students, and he’d chosen to live in the dorms. He was dating his high school girlfriend long-distance at the time, so he didn’t look at any other girls, ever. But thinking back, he’d noticed Jia. She was a bright, encouraging presence among them, always in the dorm lobby, chatting with anyone who walked by. Yixing hadn’t stopped to talk to her. And anyway, within the year Lu Han’s parents found out he was living in the dorms and he’d been forced to move into the family mansion, and Yixing followed the next year. Meng Jia faded into the background, a person he recognized on campus but rarely thought about, up until this semester.

Yixing rubbed his brow and sighed. Cigars could be smoked slowly, which made him feel better. He didn’t feel Lu Han’s restless need to run through as much nicotine as possible, but he wanted its steadying influence and the motion of smoking, drawn up from a long-abandoned habit. He shouldn’t really look down on Lu Han for whatever overwhelmed him now, seeing as Yixing himself had been an absolute wreck when his girlfriend broke up with him during his sophomore year. They were supposed to get married—or that’s what Yixing, with the naiveté of youth, had in mind. By all appearances they were the perfect couple. Same income bracket. Same ideas about the world. She was pretty in a way other people described as plain, but Yixing had thought that made her more pure. Once he started talking marriage, though, things had gone downhill fast. Now he saw that he’d been too demanding, too rigid, and she’d reacted to him the way a girl trapped by the expectations of wealth and elite society might be expected to. Yixing didn’t blame her, really. He felt very little toward her when she popped up on social media, still as rich and pretty as ever, but a distant stranger. She was right, though, that he was a fool in love.

His feelings toward Jia had changed so slowly that he’d been fairly successful at pretending the shift wasn’t happening at all. By lying to himself he could continue enjoying his time with her without his conscience cutting in. Now, though, that option was gone. She didn’t want to see him anymore, for one big reason that made a lot of sense. He wondered if Kris would step up to the plate for her. He didn’t really know the guy well enough to judge, but he did know it would be a messy situation if Kris married her. Wouldn’t go well. But Yixing believed very firmly that Kris should do _something_ , because it was incredibly unjust for Jia to be forced to deal with all this alone.

He rested his chin on his hand and slowly blew smoke out of his mouth. Deep inside his chest burned a low, smoldering anger. Anger at Kris, for not seeing what he had in front of him. Anger at Jia, for wanting to be with someone so wrong for her. Anger at himself, for letting his feelings develop this far.

But as he turned over each thought in his head, he sighed and rubbed his eyes. None of his own thoughts seemed very fair, either. Jealousy wouldn’t get him anywhere. He wasn’t entitled to Jia, and the only way jealousy developed was through the sense of being cheated out of something one deserved. If there was one thing Yixing’s grandfather made sure that everyone in the Zhang tribe understood, it was that none of them were entitled to anything. Yixing had to snuff out his anger, because looking at it, it wasn’t very fair of him, either.

He didn’t understand, though. He could allow himself that much—the inability to understand. Jia seemed to him like a sunny, clear day, while Kris was a brewing storm, threatening lightning and downpours at any moment. Yixing couldn’t understand that because it seemed to him that Kris would inevitably sully Jia, just by his nature. But then she did say that she wanted to fix guys like Kris. There was a lot that Yixing would never understand.

He rolled the cigar back and forth between his fingers. Fuck—she was pregnant. Yixing easily imagined what everyone else would have to say when they found out. They would be cruel. Even with the words only floating through his imagination, Yixing could feel his temper building.

He realized that he didn’t much care that she was pregnant. It was unfortunate, because life would be so terribly difficult for her from this point forward. And as far as he was concerned, life should only be an endless succession of good things for Jia. Then again, after drilling into their heads that none of them were entitled to anything, Yixing’s grandfather also declared that it was foolish to be afraid of hardship, because without it, they could never understand happiness and would live life by insatiable cravings. Yixing had a lot of his grandfather’s maxims stored up in his head, and they always popped up at times like this. He rubbed at his eyes again. Jia was strong enough to endure the hardship, he was certain. He just wished he could help her somehow.

He didn’t want anything in return. No—that was a lie. He wanted to be with her very badly. He could listen to her talk about anything and everything for years. He loved her relentless positivity and her kindness and the fire he saw flare up now and then, usually when Tao or Sehun said something idiotic. He wanted to help her, but not because he expected her to return his feelings—or rather, he had to be careful not to expect anything. If he expected something from her, he wouldn’t have much integrity to speak of.

But if he could—he’d do anything. Anything. And maybe he’d do it because he hoped for something in return, but it didn’t matter in the end, really, if his feelings were returned or not. In his opinion, the world owed Meng Jia a better lot than the one she’d been dealt.

Yixing ran his hand over his face and sighed. He looked at the ember of the cigar in his hand, then tossed it onto the concrete beneath him and stamped it out with his heel. He couldn’t help Jia if she didn’t want his help. The only thing he could do was remind her that he was willing—but if she didn’t want him around, then he would step out of the picture. He thought about this for a moment, wondering if it was a defense mechanism to keep himself from getting hurt. Maybe it was. Maybe he should keep showing up until she believed that he really cared for her.

But if he kept trying to care for her and she rejected him? Yixing raked his fingers through his hair. Yeah, he wouldn’t take that well. That was too painful to imagine. He had to take a step back and care from a distance. From this point forward—he had to let go of her.

Feeling deflated and a little empty, Yixing got up, threw the rest of the box of cigars in the trash, and walked back.

 

 

* * *

 

Feifei turned off her phone as she sped into the heart of downtown. She didn’t want her secretary to call, and this was the fastest option. She was twenty minutes early for her appointment, but it didn’t matter. Feifei needed time to think over what she was going to do—after all, releasing information about what could be potentially the biggest corruption case in years was something that needed careful handling.

She turned into the building of the newspaper that her college classmate worked in. Miranda was a reporter who was half-Chinese, and specialised in U.S.-China relations because according to her, “it was practically what I was born for”. In their West Coast Ivy of a university, she stood out because she was one of the very few students who overachieved without any pressure from their backgrounds. Miranda interned at the UN office in Geneva because she wanted to, and not because her father wanted something glowing on her resume in preparation for her eventual takeover of the family business.

So Miranda was the best person to turn to, Feifei thought as the elevator ascended, if she wanted to break the news and catch everyone unaware. Doing it in China would be far too risky and close to impossible. Her father had eyes everywhere in the country. The U.S., though, had loopholes that Feifei could utilise. Miranda was one of them.

“I have an appointment with Miranda Kao.” The receptionist nodded and picked up the phone to put in a call. Feifei took in her surroundings—Miranda worked for one of the most prestigious newspapers in the state. If she could get things to jump start from here, Feifei was sure that it wouldn’t take long before the central government back in the motherland would get wind of things.

“This way, Miss Wang.” The receptionist stood up and led the way in. It was a bustling, busy office, with phones ringing off their hooks as they traversed through the newsroom. Feifei nodded in thanks to the receptionist as she stopped at the door of a small office with a tag that had Miranda’s name on it. She paused for a brief beat, before knocking on the door sharply.

“Come in.” Feifei pushed the door open, and her old classmate was behind her desk, phone clutched to her ear. She waited until Miranda had finished animatedly arguing about the length of her article, before she put the phone down and stood up to walk around the desk and give her a hug. “Wang Feifei. How long has it been?”

“Three years, maybe.” Feifei smiled tightly and Miranda grinned back at her. “You seem to be doing well.”

“A reporter doing well? Never.” Miranda laughed and gestured for her to take a seat. Feifei settled down in the plush leather chair and put her Balenciaga primly on her lap. Miranda sat down opposite and looked at her almost curiously. “What brings you here though, Managing Director?”

Feifei inclined her head. “I read your article on the new generation of Chinese leaders and their potential positions in the Politburo.” She leaned forward, just slightly. “It was very illuminating.”

Miranda smiled the smallest of smiles, and leaned forward as well. “You know how it goes, the young takes over from the new. New waves can’t be formed if the old ones don’t crash out and die on the shore.”

She had used a metaphor that Feifei’s father was overly fond of. He was always going on and on about how they had to keep up with the times, they had to rejuvenate and energise their ranks so that they wouldn’t fall behind. The Country was moving forward, and so would they. Now, Feifei’s lip curled, he would be the one crashing on the shore.

“I have something for you.” She said, and reached into her bag as Miranda’s eyes lit up. “It may just be the biggest scoop of your life.”


	11. 寔命不猶

寔命不猶  
_our lot is not like hers_

 

 

“I just sent the article into my editor,” Miranda said over the phone. Feifei was in her office, and it was late evening. Most of her employees had already gone home. She looked at the papers strewn across her desk, but couldn’t focus on any of the words, her whole mind tuned into the hollow sound of Miranda’s bustling office on the other end of the line.

“So how long?” Feifei asked. On her laptop screen was a schedule of Syopin Online’s six month trajectory. She’d been working late into the night on it for weeks, and it might not even matter, after this. She tapped her fingers against the desk.

“This article? Less than a week for it to be finalized. Feifei?” Miranda sounded suddenly serious. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

Feifei stood up and turned around to look at the long windows overlooking the L.A. skyline. Outside the evening was still sunny and bright, but inside her office everything was cool and hushed. The contrast mirrored how Feifei felt—she knew Miranda was asking her a very serious question, and yet Feifei could not find any emotions stirring within herself.

“Yes,” she said. “It’s the right thing to do.”

“Well, good luck to all of us,” Miranda said. “Pretty sure I’ll be banned from the Mainland after this.”

Miranda said a few more things, none of which Feifei paid attention to. Finally Miranda said goodbye and Feifei pulled the phone away from her ear and stood looking out at the sun reflecting off the windows of the buildings, the smog blotting the blue skies. After this was published, almost anything could happen. The evidence she’d given Miranda wasn’t enough to indict anyone, but more than enough to force an investigation. She had plenty of records that incriminated her father and pointed toward Procurator-General Lu, but not enough records to show how vast she suspected the corruption really was. Numbers on a page wouldn’t bring about the jail sentence Feifei thought these numerous men deserved, but it was still enough to upend their comfortable world. The government would be embarrassed by the article published in a foreign newspaper, and at least _something_ would be done. She didn’t know what, but pulling the pretty mask off some of the richest men in the world was certainly a start.

She tapped her phone against her chin. Unbidden, a memory crawled up out of the past, lurking around in the room with her. She tried to push it away, but it wouldn’t leave, hanging around in the air.

A few days before her mother died, she and her father had been sitting in the private room they paid for in a hospital in Texas. It was supposedly one of the best hospitals in the world, which was why her mother had been coming here for the last ten years—and yet, by that point, she was frequently asleep, and Feifei and her father were simply waiting for her to die. Her mother looked pale, wan, like a stranger lying in the bed. Even having seen her decline it was hard for Feifei not to feel like a spirit had come in and stolen her mother away and the woman who remained with them was someone else. Later she would regret that she hadn’t grieved properly, but at the time Feifei could not help but dissociate.

She remembered that her father stood up, looking vacantly around the room. He was neither a large nor a small man, but he had a way of turning a space in towards himself, and he did that then, drawing Feifei’s attention away from the ghost-like woman in the bed and over to him.

“Let’s go for a walk,” he announced. “I want to tell you something.”

Too numb to be rebellious, Feifei got up and followed him. They wandered the halls of the hospital until they came to a large window overlooking the parking lot, the city beyond. The sunny, bright day seemed like a dream, something untouchable and unreal, compared to the cool quiet of the hospital.

Her father folded his arms over his chest and sighed. “Your mother won’t be with us much longer,” he said, addressing the window rather than her. Feifei made no noise, but simply waited.

After a spell of silence, her father spoke again. “Her request—demand, really—is that you inherit everything. She wants you to take my place in the business. Do you think you can do that?”

Feifei slowly shifted her eyes from the birds she was watching in the tree outside the window, to meet her father’s gaze. She didn’t say anything, knowing any words she could use would do little to impress her father. Instead, she stared at him boldly, and inclined her head. He gave a small laugh.

“I think so too,” he said. “I think so. But only if you can follow in my footsteps.” His lips pursed, he turned to look out the window again. “Your mother was a formidable woman. The leukemia robbed her of too much. But even so, you will have to take after me if you want to be the heir to the empire I’ve built.”

Again, Feifei didn’t say anything. She resembled her mother physically, but her mother always bemoaned that Feifei’s temperament was too much like her father’s. Now that her mother was on her deathbed, though, Feifei felt a kinship with her that she had never felt with him. She didn’t know how her life would go forward after her mother was dead. Imagining losing her father in the same way stirred little emotion in her.

“I’m going to tell you a story that I’ve never told anyone before,” he said, grasping his hands behind his back so he stood tall, like a soldier. He glanced over at her, a frown turning down the corners of his mouth. “No one likes to discuss the Cultural Revolution, you know. Too complicated. Too confusing. I have fond memories, many fond memories, of my childhood. There were many good things, but it was also a bloody time. A strange time for a child to grow up. But it taught me everything, about people.”

He turned to her and stared down at her, his eyes boring into hers but somehow he seemed to be elsewhere, also. Feifei did not let herself look away, although she wanted to.

“People will not show you mercy, Feifei. You must learn how to protect yourself, or everyone else will gladly trample over you. I learned this when I was a child and the rumors started circling round that my family would be the next—we’d too much land before the revolution, you see, and at that time people were looking for anyone to cast out just to keep themselves alive. This is how people function. And I found out that my father was being called a capitalist, that sooner or later he’d be sent off to the countryside for reeducation or worse. I was a small boy. I was afraid. But I also knew that if I could deflect people’s attention for a little while, there was a good chance that my family would be passed over this time around, and people might forget just long enough for us to survive.”

Feifei didn’t let her surprise show on her face. The Cultural Revolution lurked in the country’s history, known but infrequently discussed. The adults she knew had little reason to reminisce. China lurched forward at a frenzied pace, and reflecting on the past did not put money in anyone’s pockets. She knew very few things—in the early 1980s her mother’s family, though by no means rich, was better off than her father’s. But her father had seized the opportunities of the economic reforms to build his corporation, which she now stood to inherit. In her parents’ lifetime, the old China had been put to rest and in its place was a gangly teenager, scowling at the rest of the world, with his hands fisted in his pockets.

“At this time,” he continued, turning to look out the window once again, “I happened to overhear my neighbors talking. Late at night, so they had no idea they could be overheard. They said it was a shame for people to suffer for crimes they never chose. Perhaps they were right, but in this time it was not the sort of thing anyone said. In the morning, I went and secretly informed the authorities of what I’d overheard. It turned into a massive rumor, and this family was sent away, while my family remained. People had forgotten about us in the middle of all the gossip.”

He turned away from the window again. She could see the wrinkles beginning to form around his face, the dark circles under his eyes caused by their long weeks at the hospital.

“In this world, Feifei,” he said, “You cannot trust other people to care for you. If I hadn’t sought to protect myself and my family back then, we would have nothing now. You must be savage if you want to save anything. You must fight until you’ve worked your hands to the bone. This is what will make you great.”

Now, standing in her office in LA, Feifei still remembered how she’d recoiled from her father’s words. How harsh they sounded to her ears. She’d resolved then and there to take after her mother—to follow her mother’s advice and her mother’s teachings, because her father might be a great man, but he was not a good one.

The trouble was, as Feifei stood at the brink of her mission reaching its end, she didn’t know if she was unlike her father, or utterly like him in every way.

 

* * *

 

It took half an hour for Jia to gather up all the miscellaneous items of Kris’s she’d collected in the past few months. Whenever she found one—a shirt of his buried in a clothes hamper, a sweatshirt fallen under her bed, a book he’d loaned her and she’d barely read—she placed it on her bed and looked at it. Not reminiscing, exactly. The items inspired no tears, and whatever regret she felt fell bluntly to the pit of her stomach. But she wanted these things seared in her memory, because—well, there was no use in lying to herself. These things of his represented the months that had brought her to her current situation. In some sense, she did love him. She planned to tell him the truth, that she was keeping their child and she wanted nothing from him at all. He should know.

She put all of his things into an old grocery bag and took them out to her car and sat still for a long few minutes, listening to her own rattling breath. Every new step she took felt symbolic, but for this one, she could only hope for the best. Finally, she gathered the courage to start up her car.

She knew he was home by the light shining out from the window at the front of his condo. This was a mean surprise but she’d been afraid that if she called first, she wouldn’t go through with it, and would just avoid him rather than making a clean break. Breaking up with him at this point was inevitable. Kris could not be a father. It broke her heart, but she couldn’t wish he was anyone different than he was. That would only cause her greater heartbreak.

She rang the doorbell and waited with her eyes on the toes of her Converse sneakers. The door opened and she looked up. The sight of his face, illuminated from one side by the light in the hall and the rest caught in shadow, reminded her of the first night she’d met him, standing at the bar with adrenaline running through her as his eyes wandered across her body. Tonight her adrenaline was fueled only by dread. Part of her wanted to go back in time to become that girl who’d smiled slyly at him and eagerly gone home with him, to the rush and heady bliss of the first time they’d had sex, but she wondered if all of that was only an illusion crafted by her excitement and misguided hope. She lived in cold reality now, where there was no room for a man who could make love to her but not love her enough to care for her when things were difficult. She didn’t resent him for that—but she saw him in a clearer light now. She only needed him to listen.

“I had some of your stuff at my apartment,” she said, holding out the bag. He took it from her, his movements slow and abridged, like he wasn’t sure where he was or what was happening.

He looked at the grocery bag in his hands for a moment, pondering it, and then his eyes flicked back up to hers. “Did you—” He stumbled and ran a hand over his hair, eyes darting behind her, to the ground, back to hers. “You know. Is it—did you do it?”

She opened her mouth to tell him _no, I’m not going to,_ but stopped the words in her mouth. His eyes were shrouded with terror the way they had been the day in the parking garage.

“Kris, you have to understand—”

“We can’t have a kid,” he interrupted. He laughed like he was in pain. “We’re both twenty-five years old. Jia. Maybe for our parents that was okay but—for us? Everything is different now and we—we have nothing—”

Jia thought to point out to him that he was filthy rich, but she held her tongue. Experience had taught her that these things were relative; “enough” money to her meant poverty to these people.

“You have to understand what I—” she began, hoping to tell him about her own parents. About her own fears. About how in the end, motherhood—even the most inconvenient kind—was the only option for her. Some people chose otherwise. That wasn’t her choice. He needed to understand.

But he dropped the grocery bag of his things on the ground and gripped her shoulders, eyes wide with fear and, to her shock, tears welling in his eyes. He didn’t cry, but his eyes glittered and roamed wildly across her face.

“You don’t get it, do you?” he said. “We’d be—we’d be outcasts, we’d be failures, we would—we would never be able to—don’t do this, _please_.”

Looking at him, Jia realized that she could not tell him the truth. She realized that until Kris could accept his failures—until he strove to make changes for himself—she would always be fighting against his fears. No one was strong enough to win a battle against someone else's fears.

“I’ve taken care of it,” she exclaimed. “I’ve taken care of it.”

Kris deflated against the doorframe, relief washing over his features. His hands slid from her shoulders to hold onto her hands and he looked at her, eyes imploring.

“Then you should—you should come inside.” He choked out, and gave her a small smile.

Jia sighed and shook her head. She gently pulled her hands out of his grasp. “Kris, it’s over between us.”

 

* * *

 

When Jia said, _”I’ve taken care of it,”_ Kris was overwhelmed by a deluge of relief.

When she said, _”It’s over between us,”_ he felt as though the air had thinned of oxygen.

He gaped at her, searching for something to say like he was gasping for air to breathe. His thoughts wouldn’t click together. He couldn’t see the connecting bridge between _taken care of it_ and _it’s over_. If the problem was gone then things should return to normal.

But she just stared back at him, her hands grasped in front of her.

“Over?” he repeated. It sounded idiotic to his own ears, the dumb mumblings of a pathetic man. The line between her eyebrows grew deeper and she took a half-step backwards.

“It’s for the best,” she said in a very small voice. He couldn’t tell what she was thinking, and even though this wasn’t the stranger who had been in the parking garage the week before telling him she was pregnant, this still wasn’t Jia. Jia would come inside.

She took another half-step backwards and his thoughts took a rough click forward. Still nothing was connecting, but he couldn’t let her leave. If she left she would never come back and Kris knew this because he had a lot of experience with people who didn’t come back. He fooled himself into thinking that he was fine on his own but he pictured going back inside without her and climbing into bed alone while she went off to god-knows-where and all he knew was that she could not leave.

He sucked in a deep breath to calm himself. “Why?” he coughed up, still unable to string together a sequence of words. “I’m sorry if I—” he began, then realized he didn’t know what to apologize for. She was leaving him and he couldn’t figure out what to apologize for to make her stay.

“Kris,” Jia whispered, but she didn’t move any closer.

“I’ll change,” he promised quickly. He didn’t know how he would change but he had become whoever he needed to be in the past and he could become whoever he needed to be now just so long as he didn’t go back inside alone. He didn’t realize how terrified he was to go back inside alone until it started happening. Before he didn’t want her to come because she brought with her a mistake that would undo him, and now he didn’t want her to leave because she would take with her—he didn’t know what. Everything.

“It’s for the best,” she said again. Her mouth hung open while she stared at him, and then she continued. “You know that we—we were never really good for each other to begin with. You know? We were just—having fun. That’s what you said. And I’m not—I’m not rich, or beautiful, we were just—what was it that guy said? Fuck buddies, and—”

“What?” Kris choked out. The truth of what she said hurt all the worse. She wasn’t supposed to _mean_ anything to him but he couldn’t let her leave.

“You won’t miss me,” she told him, the smallest and saddest of smiles twisting her lips.

“Of course I will.” Kris took a step forward, reaching out for her on instinct, like an insect drifting toward a burning light. She didn’t move when he touched her hair, but she looked at the ground, and somehow this felt like a blow to his stomach. “Jia—Jia you can’t go, you can’t just—don’t just _leave me_.”

She stared hard at the ground. He felt a pressure behind his eyes, but he wouldn’t cry. Crying was a sign of weakness and as a kid he’d been slapped for crying too many times to count—he shouldn’t be this soft, but she wouldn’t look at him and he couldn’t lose her. His hand moved down to brush his fingertips against the side of her jaw, her neck, before he finally rested his hand on her shoulder and wondered what sort of man he would be if he begged her to stay.

She finally looked up at him and his heart lurched.

“We can’t be together anymore,” she said. “Sometimes—sometimes relationships just run their course and you have to know when to say goodbye.”

She took several steps backwards and in desperation he grabbed hold of her arm and jostled her back toward him. She gave a soft cry of protest and their eyes met again, while he held onto her arm so tightly he could feel the bone through the muscle and her eyes widened with something like fear.

Something snapped loose inside him then, as they stood there, quiet and still. He couldn’t trust her—he thought Jia, by virtue of being outside the world he knew, was different—but she wasn’t. In the end he couldn’t count on her to stay anymore than he could count on anyone else, and he’d been a fool to expose his heart this way.

“Kris,” she whispered, “You’ll be okay, you really will be okay—”

He let go of her arm and she stumbled back before she regained her balance.

“I don’t need your pity,” he spat. He watched her rub her hand around the place where his hand had gripped her arm, and he saw the pity in her eyes, and he hated her. He didn’t need her and never should have let himself think he did.

“Kris—”

“Just go!” His voice rose in volume. She still wore that horrible look of fear and pity and he despised her. He’d been such an idiot.

She didn’t say anything else. She stared at him for a long moment, then she turned around and walked to her car parked on the side of the street. For a brief moment, while the engine rumbled to life and the headlights came on, Kris wanted to run after her and apologize. But he pushed that thought down and reminded himself that this was what he should have expected. He shouldn’t have trusted her.

He watched her drive away and then he stared at the empty spot where her car had been. Then he went inside and closed the front door, slumped back against it, and sunk to the floor.

 

* * *

 

His parents usually came over every summer just to check on things—him, mostly—and that amounted to many dinners, Segyun escaping on dates with Chorong, Sehun babysitting Seyun, and their baby brother turning a year older. But this year, things were going to be different, and Sehun was happy to say that the number one reason why had the last name Ahn.

“I’ll be there,” he assured his mother over the phone as she reminded him of their flight times, “don’t worry, Mom.”

“Have you ever proven yourself worthy of that?” Mrs. Oh scoffed over the Pacific, and Sehun tried not to roll his eyes. Sohee’s influence was really getting to him. “Anyway, Seyun says he’s really excited to turn six. Didn’t you promise him Disneyland when you were back last winter?”

“Sure.” Sehun agreed readily. “Anything for baby bro.”

“Sehun.” His mother paused briefly. “Are you okay? Why are you so chipper? It’s babysitting Seyun we’re talking about.”

“Well,” Sehun kept his eyes trained on Sohee as she walked out of his kitchen with an empty glass, before realising it and doubling back in again, “babysitting’s more fun when you have a girlfriend to come along.”

Sohee and his mother gasped at the same time. Sehun laughed, and Sohee sped walked to where he was. He could hear his mother saying something over the phone, possibly asking for a name, and he stood up quickly so that his phone would be out of Sohee’s reach.

“It’s Sohee,” he informed his mother quite pragmatically, and Sohee swiped at him. “We’re dating super seriously.”

His mother could have been saying something else but his phone then chose to announce its imminent dearth of battery with a loud beep.

“Oh.” Sehun arranged his features into some semblance of pity, and Sohee grabbed for his arm. “That’s sad. Guess you have to tell her yourself when she comes over.”

“Oh Sehun.” Sohee looked like she was ready to bite his head off. Sehun was willing to let her, though. “That was so unnecessary.”

“Hey, Minseok hyung knows.” He pointed out and she opened her mouth for a moment, before clamping it back shut. Why was she so incredibly cute? Sehun sighed and draped an arm strategically over her shoulders so that he could envelop her in a hug anytime and she wouldn’t notice. “It’s only fair that one of my family members gets the bomb dropped on them too.”

She glared up at him for a long moment, but didn’t push his arm away. It made Sehun smile even wider, and Sohee pushed his face away for that. Sehun let out a noise of derision and flopped himself onto the sofa. Sohee sat down beside him and looked like she was contemplating whether to drill a hole in him or not. Sehun would unbutton his shirt for her easy access, he was willing to say that much.

“Hey,” he nudged her after she’d stared at the switched-off TV for a few minutes, “are you angry?”

He didn’t want her to be, because it would inevitably lead to a whole lot of her hitting him, which would lead to her coming too close, and then him just having to deal with the fact that she didn’t seem too interested in actually physically touching him. Which, Sehun thought, was completely unfair and totally detrimental to their current act as a loving couple.

“No,” she rolled her eyes and punched him on the shoulder lightly, “but you’re still an asshole.”

“Look,” Sehun sat up straight and faced her. Sohee’s eyes wandered somewhere else above his head for a moment, but looked at him soon enough. “We’re stuck like this for now, okay? I’m totally willing to help you out here, baby, but you have to play your part convincingly if you want Minseok hyung to be in the dark.”

Sohee narrowed her eyes at him, but seemed willing to listen. Sehun drew in a deep breath and willed that for once, he’d remember everything his grandfather had lectured him about on being a convincing barterer. He was an Oh, it was supposed to be in his blood, but Sehun didn’t thinking praying a little would do any harm.

“Do you know how far away you jump whenever I, like, touch you?” Sehun wagged a finger. “So not couple behaviour.”

“Your arm’s heavy.” Sohee scrunched up her nose at him. Sehun tried not to sigh at how attractive she made it look. It was so odd, because a few months ago he wouldn’t even have dared to think about it. Minseok’s biceps were, in fact, very effective deterrents. “And I do _not_ jump whenever you touch me.”

“Okay, show me.” He challenged, and Sohee paused, before looking back up at him and scooting all the way next to him so that she was almost close to sitting on his lap. That was very fast progress. Sehun coughed, and Sohee raised an eyebrow. “Fine, you don’t jump. But we don’t, you know, physically look like a couple?”

“You’re making this much sense right now.” Sohee pinched her fingers together and Sehun frowned. “What next? It’s not like you let go of my hand when I ask you to.”

Sehun took it as a sign of approval for him to slip his fingers between hers. Sohee gave him a severe look, but she didn’t let go. It wasn’t like she minded, he thought, and true enough her fingers were completely relaxed. What a liar.

“Why don’t you let go first, then?” Sehun asked in return, and Sohee’s response was to clobber him with her fists. It didn’t hurt at all, and when she was done with attacking him mainly around his shoulders, she’d ended up sitting on his lap. Sohee didn’t seem to have noticed, but Sehun certainly did. He locked his arms around her so that she wouldn’t slide off, and Sohee glared at him, still oblivious to the fact that she was no longer sitting on the sofa.

“Yeah, because it’s my fault?” Sohee frowned at him, and Sehun laughed. “What are you laughing at?”

“Nothing.” He leaned forward and rested his forehead against hers. She swatted him on the ear but didn’t pull away. “See, this is what couples do.”

“I know what couples do.” She grumbled and Sehun laughed again. Everything felt so right. Especially when they weren’t in danger of running into her older brother with the scary biceps. Sehun crinkled his nose and Sohee poked him in the cheek. “Are you done?”

He pulled back and looked at her very seriously. “Couples kiss.”

Sohee stared at him for an extended beat, before she narrowed her eyes. “Are you telling me that you think we should make out now?”

“No,” Sehun shrugged, “but it’s obviously courteous for a girlfriend to kiss her boyfriend, and well definitely otherwise, so what do you think Minseok hyung will think when you never, ever kiss me at al—”

Sohee leaned over at that exact moment and kissed him softly on the cheek. He was used to her perfume, now that he hung around her all the time, but to experience it up this close was almost a little terrifying for Sehun. His heart was racing at quite an incredible speed. He wasn’t going to tell her, though.

“Happy?” She said, and Sehun kind of wanted to ask her to do it again, but decided against it. So he reached forward and pressed a very slow kiss to her forehead. He could feel her stiffen, just for a few seconds, before she relaxed and peered up at him, eyes a little too bright for Ahn Sohee.

“Happier.” He wiggled his eyebrows at her, and she reached to hit his shoulder lightly. She was a lot closer now, and Sehun was now very acutely aware of the fact that the girl he’d been hovering around for the whole of forever (he hadn’t bothered to count, now that he thought about it, but Sehun found it far too short) was sitting on his lap, lips very close to his own. Sohee seemed to realise it too, because she froze and their eyes locked for what seemed to be the longest time Sehun had ever held so still.

Then she blinked, and he went for it.

Sehun considered himself a good kisser, really, and everyone else that he’d kissed appeared to agree. But he was now fighting what seemed to be a very sorry losing battle against Sohee. The scent of her perfume was everywhere, as he pulled her closer by the waist, not wanting to break the moment. Sohee’s hair was tangled, just a little, in his fingers, and when Sehun pulled by sheer accident, she kissed him back even more fiercely.

“I—” They pulled away for a brief moment, and Sohee’s eyes were wild with bewilderment. “What—”

“Happiest.” Sehun murmured, and kissed her again. This time they went slow, and Sehun felt her sit up a little straighter and concentrate on how to kiss him in a way that made him want to concede the entire world to her. He was sure that if he really wanted to, the world would know that Ahn Sohee was really the best kisser in town. But Sehun realised that he wanted this to be their little secret. Selfish, really, but she was _his_ girlfriend.

Sohee finally pulled away and they stayed there for a while, her panting softly against him. It felt so domestic, so appropriate, that Sehun dropped another kiss on her forehead and then the tip of her nose. He shifted a little so that Sohee could sit better, and she didn’t seem able to look him in the eye. When she was the better kisser? Sehun looked at them, reflected off in the TV, and saw himself grin. He looked kind of stupid, but it was worth it.

“Now no one’s going to say we’re not a couple.” He whispered in her ear and got a punch back from her. Sehun’s response was to kiss her on the cheek, and then the forehead again. “Not even Minseok hyung.”

Sohee punched him again, and this time Sehun guffawed as she hid her face in her hands, keeled forward, and banged her forehead against his chest. It hurt, but as he ran a hair through her hair and stared at the ceiling, her weight heavy on him, it was worth it. Pretty much.

 

* * *

 

Waiting for the article to be published kept Feifei living in limbo. She went through the motions of work, but ended up procrastinating on a lot of it, unable to see the point when the Wang Corporation would soon cease to exist. But this too inspired in her a kind of mourning, where she wandered the halls of the L.A. offices after hours and experienced a grief not altogether different than what she had felt when her mother died. Different in degree, but not in nature. It was awful to watch something that should have been healthy and full of life get eaten away by cancer until finally its death became inevitable. Just like she had in the last weeks of her mother’s life, Feifei waited for death to come by wandering the halls in a listless silence.

Her father was coming to L.A. on a trip he’d had planned since Syopin Online’s launch, and Feifei found something poetic in knowing that her father would be here with her when she demolished the company he’d built on corrupt foundations. She would be anonymous, but she knew her father might well suspect her. She would not enjoy being treated like a traitor for the rest of her life, but she’d been careful to cover her tracks. No one at the office knew that she knew Miranda, and their connection as classmates did not mean that anyone would be able to point the finger to Feifei for providing the evidence. Nevertheless it was daunting, knowing that for the rest of her life she would be carrying this lie.

She found herself wandering the half-lit hallways of the office the evening before her father was due to arrive. The low light of dusk cast the offices in an eerie glow, but Feifei found it strangely calming. Their offices occupied three floors, and she walked up from the floor her office was on to the next one, stopping for a long few minutes in the stairwell to look out the window at the city below. Her heels echoed when she turned and continued up the steps, emerging out into the next floor. A light shone out of one of the offices at the end of the hall. Feifei breathed in a little, breathed out, and then she followed the beacon of that glowing light.

She leaned against the doorjamb of the office and folded her arms across her chest. “What are you still doing here?” she asked, expecting a fight. Almost wanting one. The anticipation of the news article made her agitated. She wanted to take her mind off it.

But Kris did not say anything. He kept his head bent toward the laptop in front of him, although he was not typing. “I’ve got to get this done before your dad gets here,” he said. But nothing indicated he would start soon.

Feifei knew something was wrong whenever she came across him in the office in the last few weeks. He seemed to have lost weight recently, his cheekbones protruding more noticeably than usual. He had dark circles under his eyes and avoided her questions. And there was the problem with the sub-contract files, to which he’d reacted so dramatically. Something was going on, something more serious than Feifei had presumed. She walked into the office and sat herself gingerly against his desk, close enough that she couldn’t help herself, and reached out to gently touch his shoulder.

“Hey,” she said, tilting her head down to try to draw his eyes up from the desk. “What’s wrong with you?”

Distraught, Kris was more handsome than he ever was happy or angry. He looked up at her with dark, sorrowful eyes that almost seemed to glow in the last of the day’s sunlight that came in through the window.

“Do you really care?” he asked.

Feifei curled her fingers into his shoulder. This person in front of her was someone she had never met before. Kris, but with so many layers of masks peeled back, she almost got a sense of who he might have been if he’d been raised by someone else, somewhere else.

“I care,” Feifei said softly. She wondered how this Kris would take the next day’s news. This Kris was raw with doleful eyes and tender skin. This Kris, she almost wanted to protect.

“Well,” he said. He leaned back in his chair, pulling away from her touch. She let her hand slide down his arm and she waited, watching while he ran his hands back through his hair and stared up at the ceiling. “Jia dumped me,” he laughed, bitterly. “And I feel so—”

He didn’t finish his thought, but instead fell silent, eyes still on the ceiling. Feifei didn’t dare breathe. So that was it, then—Jia had broken his heart. Feifei hadn’t known he had a heart to break. At least now she could stop worrying about the pictures of Jia he kept as a bargaining chip on his phone.

On impulse, she reached out and touched him again, resting her palm against the part of his arm closest to her. He reacted to her touch like he was drawn in by the warmth, dropping his eyes from the ceiling and then curling toward her until his forehead rested on her thigh. She threaded her fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck and wondered if he would cry. This was an intimacy Feifei didn’t know what to do with. The intimacy of anguish. Different entirely from their rendezvous in the library months earlier. She thought of that now, how she’d used physical intimacy for the purposes of ensnaring him so that eventually she would be able to destroy him. That kind of intimacy she understood. This was different, and although it scared her, she could not move away.

“Don’t worry,” she said softly, running her fingers across the warm skin of the back of his neck. “Soon, none of this will matter anymore.” Soon they would be standing on the ruins of an empire.

He shifted to look up at her, but Feifei did not move her hand away but let it slide to the side of his face. Once again she was met with eyes deep as pools, begging for something to alleviate his misery. She rubbed her thumb very slowly against the line of his jaw. Back, and forth. She could feel his pulse jump. She could hear the silence reverberating as though they were underwater. Removed from the rest of the world.

She knew better. But his pulse throbbed under her fingers and his eyes made her heart ache.

She leaned down and pressed her lips against his.

They moved slowly. He leaned into her, lifting his face closer to hers and moving to hold himself steady. His fingers dug into the small of her back. She pushed forward, rising into the kiss. Into the torment of the warm wetness of his mouth, the sensation of his breath and the heat of his skin and if she opened her eyes she’d be drowning in the sorrow of his. This kiss had no combat, only the push and pull of tides as she consumed every defense he yielded to her, pushing closer, pulling him upward. Intoxicated, she had no reservations. She would push forward indefinitely, wherever it led.

But Kris broke away without warning. Cold shock rushed in, and then humiliation. To have let her guard down willingly and been rejected. Feifei did not let such things happen to her.

He opened his mouth. But then he let it hang open, vacant of words. Feifei imagined what might be running through his mind. How strange, if he’d fallen in love with Jia only after he could no longer have her.

Feifei stood up and smoothed down her shirt. “Like I said,” she told him cooly, “Soon, none of this will matter anymore.”

Then she left, and it wasn’t until she was back in her own office that she could steady her racing heart.

No matter. The only thing that was important was to complete her mission. Nothing else.

She repeated this mantra to herself for the next few days until she was certain she believed it.

 

* * *

 

Feifei crossed her legs and uncrossed them slowly again, ignoring the pointed look Zhou Mi was giving her. Her father had already been late for thirty minutes. She knew that her father paid no heed to time when it came to meetings, because he found it degrading to come early when the other party was the one asking for the favour. He had no idea that he was the one who would be begging later, Feifei thought, and her lip curled. She uncrossed her legs and stood up to look out the window of the private room that she had booked at her father’s favourite restaurant in Chinatown.

“Are you sure this is the right thing to do?” Zhou Mi asked, and she turned around to look at him. “He _is_ your father. ” He held her gaze for a moment, before he went back to looking at his phone. Feifei stared at him for a while. She knew that Zhou Mi found her actions to be more ruthless than he’d personally be, but it didn’t matter. She was doing the correct thing.

She opened her mouth to say something, when the doors swung open and her father walked in, smoking a cigar that was bound to be from some place where it was the most expensive. Feifei narrowed her eyes and let Zhou Mi stand up in her place. “You’re not allowed to smoke in here,” she pointed out, and her father gave her a slightly smug look that made her want to throw a teacup at him.

“Am I?” He sat down in the mahogany chair that Zhou Mi had pulled out for him. “I don’t think they would like to offend one of their oldest customers.”

His indifference made Feifei want to gag. Here he was again with the set-in-stone mindset that nobody was ever going to go against him because he had money and his surname was Wang. Feifei had money and her surname was Wang, and she was also going to be the one accelerating his downfall. Zhou Mi was speaking to their personal server about their orders, and Feifei simply stared as her father blew out a cloud of white smoke.

“You seem relaxed,” she said, and her father simply waved a hand. “Like you have nothing else to do.”

“Accomplished people don’t need to deal with stress.” Her father replied dismissively, and stubbed his cigar into the ashtray that their server had come with. Feifei was irritated to see that he was right, that they would bend over backwards just to make sure he would come again the next time. How did Zhou Mi even believe that she was doing the wrong thing? It gave Feifei conviction yet again that she was right in going to Miranda. Her father’s take down was now necessary.

She waited until the server had shut the doors behind her to speak. “I know what you’ve been doing, Father.” Zhou Mi stiffened beside her, but Feifei didn’t care.

“Making money.” He said calmly and disappeared into another cloud of cigar smoke. “That’s why you’re wearing that fancy dress and carrying that designer bag, my dear.”

Feifei could feel her pulse racing. She took a deep breath. “How much did you give Procurator-General Lu for the online shopping mall project, Father?” She saw Zhou Mi close his eyes in what seemed like defeat. Her father was still shrouded in smoke but she could see him pause for a moment.

The smoke cleared and she saw her father emerge, a smooth, odd expression on his face. “I don’t like hearing such things from you, Feifei. Girls shouldn’t speak this way.”

“Yes, girls should keep their mouths shut, shouldn’t they? Father, I know _everything_. And I never keep my mouth shut. I’m not that kind of girl. You raised me, you should know.” She finished and saw her father’s eye twitch. A crack in the veneer, she thought. Good. She could break him down and finish him, she thought. It was going to be easy, but he hadn’t realised it yet.

“Are you accusing me, now? Wang Feifei, I am your _father_.” His voice was controlled but Feifei saw and heard the way he spat out the last word. Blood relations counted for so much in their world, but not for her. Her father had barely spoken to her ever since she was eight. When she moved to the U.S. he never ever asked where she was going, or why she wanted to study what she did, or who her friends were. Sometimes she felt like her father was the dead one, not her mother. But he wasn’t. He was here, reddening in the face, and looking like he was on the verge of slapping her because of her impertinence.

“I don’t think so.” She laughed mirthlessly, and saw out the corner of her eye Zhou Mi’s little jump of alarm. “When do you remember you have a daughter? When your fellow rich friends remind you that you don’t have a male heir?”

“You watch your mouth.” He hissed and dropped his cigar on the ashtray. It glowed red and darkened again. “How dare you speak to your father this way?”

“My mother taught me to speak the truth.” Feifei couldn’t stop now. “If she was here she’d be the one telling you the exact same thing.”

“Your mother was a weak woman who knew nothing better.” He spat back viciously and Feifei trembled with the urge to hurl something at him. “What a fine daughter she’s raised, don’t you see now? Watch your manners, Wang Feifei. You think that I don’t know what you’ve been up to lately? Your friends were bestowed upon you by _me_. If you don’t want anything to happen to that reporter, you’d better apologise to me now.”

Feifei kept her gaze on him, the man who was slightly rotund and the chairman of the Wang Corporation and her biological father. He was staring at her, red in the face, but with all the ease of a seasoned businessman well-versed in dealing with bigwigs. Her father was using his acumen on her, like she was a small-time factory owner who needed to weeded out because she wouldn’t listen. But her knees weren’t going to bend—Feifei never kowtowed. Not even to the beast she had for a father.

“You can keep wishing for that to happen.” She stood up and the chair eased backwards. “It’s too late for you to regret anything, _Father_.”

Her father then lost it. “How dare you, Wang Feifei?” He roared and she didn’t even flinch. “How dare you threaten me? Do you know what made you the person you are today? Me! And that money which went into everything you’ve ever used? Everything has happened because I made the sacrifice to do what was best for the company. And you dare to question _me_? What kind of unfilial daughter are you?”

Feifei stood ramrod straight and let him rant on about what a crazy person she was, trying to blow the whistle on his crimes? Zhou Mi was staring down at the tablecloth as her father raged on. Feifei’s brain seemed to be filtering all the insults her father was hurling at her. She felt a warm sensation in her abdomen. Still couldn’t hear a single thing her father was saying.

“I don’t care.” She shrugged and said. Her father swelled even ruddier. “I’m not you. I do the right thing.”

“The right thing is to keep your mouth _fucking shut_.” He screamed and Feifei clutched tighter on the handles of her Balenciaga. “What sort of daughter goes against her father like this?

“Me.” She said simply, and turned to leave. Zhou Mi rose a few seconds after she did, and grabbed at her hand. He was going to say something she didn’t want to hear, so Feifei pulled away. She was about to push the doors open when her father slammed his fists so hard on the table that she heard a few of the china teacups break. All she could think of was how the staff had to clean up later. All because an old, rich customer couldn’t tamp his temper down.

“Step out of that door now and you will never receive another cent from me. I will cut your inheritance off, I swear.” Her father said with his teeth gritted, and Feifei turned around slowly. He had stood up and his face was so red that he looked like he could faint if he didn’t unbutton the top button of his bespoke shirt. “I will disown you, Wang Feifei.”

She blinked unwaveringly. Asked herself if it mattered.

“Go ahead.” And she walked out.

It didn’t.

 

* * *

 

When Kris’s mother called him and informed him she was coming over, Kris suddenly remembered that the cleaning service hadn’t been to his condo in over a week and his mother would not be pleased with him at all. He closed all the doors to rooms he didn’t think she’d go into and wiped down the countertops in his kitchen, then went into the living room and gathered up all the empty beer bottles he’d left strewn around the room. He was living on little more than alcohol and bags of chips from the vending machine at the office and sticks of gum these days, and he knew it was taking a toll on his health, but he didn’t much care.

He shoved all the trash into the bin and was on his last pass through the condo when he noticed the grocery bag in the corner of the entryway. He stopped still. After Jia left, he hadn’t bothered to move the bag or even look at what was inside. Now he crouched beside it and untied the handles. On top was his t-shirt. He sat down with his back against the wall and pulled it out of the bag.

It smelled like her perfume. He held it in his hands and looked at it dumbly, the scent dragging memories up out of the muddy waters where he’d buried them. Waking up before she did in the morning and lying there with the sunshine coming in through the slats of the blinds, the way his room felt quiet and peaceful and the soft, slow sound of her breathing while she slept. Crystallized in his mind, the scene caused a dull ache in his chest. He would never have that again.

He reached into the bag and pulled out another item. A sweatshirt he’d loaned her. He remembered now—her waiting in the parking garage for him after work, dressed in a thin button-down shirt and skirt and heels. They were going out to eat but she was shivering, so he’d pulled this sweatshirt from the backseat of his car and she’d worn it without a hint of shame into the classy Italian place where they ate dinner.

And in the end none of their time together meant anything to her. He’d been discarded as easily as she’d thrown these things of his into a grocery bag. Left without a look back. It was only a few months, but now that he reflected on that time he saw how he’d let her take up more room in his life than he ever should have. Without noticing, he’d come to care for her, and expect her to care for him. But she didn’t. He should have known.

He opened the door to the hall closet and tossed the grocery bag into a dark corner. He had to forget about Jia now. If she didn’t want him, he didn’t need her. He didn’t need anyone. Not Jia, certainly not Feifei sneaking into his office and trying to confuse him, not anyone at all.

His mother arrived a half-hour later. She’d done something to her hair—dyed it, or something, Kris couldn’t really tell—and it made her look younger and also like a stranger. Of course, he hadn’t seen her in months.

“Hi, sweetheart,” she said, pulling him down to kiss him on the cheek. She drifted off into the kitchen, silently assessing the look of the place. With a glance back, she gave him a wry smile. “I can tell a young bachelor lives here. Are you even eating real food?”

He wasn’t, but Kris shrugged off her question with a grin. “I can take care of myself. Don’t worry.” He said it with as much confidence as he could muster, and she seemed satisfied.

“Good,” she said. A real smile grew slowly across her face. “You’ll need that attitude now.”

Kris didn’t know what to make of that. His mother’s smile was wide as a shark’s and she stood staring at him like she expected the two of them to celebrate—but he didn’t have a clue why. And he couldn’t seem to find the right emotions inside him to react the way she wanted. He knew he was scowling, but he kept thinking about that grocery bag lying in the dark of his hall closet.

“Why?” he asked finally, almost begrudgingly. He knew she picked up on it, because her smile fell and she looked at him with steely eyes.

“Your stepfather has just disowned Feifei,” she announced. Her words shivered in the silence of the room.

“Why?” Kris repeated, bewildered.

His mother’s eyes narrowed. “Apparently Feifei was unfilial and disrespectful to a point where he had no choice. I don’t know the details, but she’s not my daughter. It doesn’t surprise me though. Does it surprise you?” She cocked her head to the side and waited.

Kris didn’t reply. Feifei was many things. Fiery. Irritatingly self-righteous. Obstinate. But he couldn’t imagine her doing something to jeopardize her inheritance, and he found himself wanting to tell his mother that it wasn’t true. There was no way for Feifei to be disowned. But his mother knew and he didn’t.

“The only thing that matters,” his mother continued, “Is that your stepfather still needs to train someone to take his place. He’d rather not go outside the family. No one wants to turn over his empire to someone with no family ties.”

Her eyes gleamed as she spoke. Kris could hear the ambition in her voice but something coiled up in his chest stopped him from mirroring her eager smile. He still couldn’t imagine Feifei disowned, much less filling in the gap she left. In his mind’s eye he pictured her sitting on his desk in the semi-dark, beautiful and terrifying, almost unreal. Only in this moment could he admit these things to himself.

“But we’re not related,” he said just to stop up the silence.

His mother scowled, thin wrinkles appearing around her mouth and her eyes. The thing coiled up in his chest tightened around his pounding heart. He’d said the wrong thing, he realized, but he couldn’t take it back. And it was _true_ , after all—they could all play pretend but he knew he would never be a Wang, that he would always fall short of that standard because the surname written in his bones was Li, and he and his mother had been running away from that surname for over a decade. But now, with the Wang fortunes at his fingertips, Kris feared he would never escape his heritage.

“That’s all you can say?” His mother’s eyebrows lifted. Although her voice was very low and soft, Kris felt like the ground was rocking under his feet. He shouldn’t have spoken at all.

“I don’t know.” He felt like he was eight years old, hiding his bloodied hands after getting in a fight with the older boys who lived down the street, or nine years old, wondering aloud why he couldn’t go to basketball camp like the other boys in his grade. He should have learned not to say idiotic things back then. He should have remembered.

“You don’t know,” she repeated, her eyebrows lifting higher. She looked away from him, her upper lip curled, and brushed her hair out of her eyes. “I’m telling you that you are sitting at the threshold of success and all you can say is that you _don’t know_?”

He didn’t dare move a muscle, but internally he flinched. “It’s—it’s just a lot to take in,” he squeezed out, keeping his eyes just to the left of her head, avoiding her piercing gaze as best he could.

“What’s wrong?” she demanded. He met her gaze and thought he saw concern mingled with her frustration, but it could have been the lights reflecting off her eyes.

“Things are just—tough. At work, I mean.” Kris tried to imagine telling his mother the truth. A month ago he’d uploaded a picture of himself and Jia to his Instagram, forgetting that it was a public account, and his mother called him and interrogated him on all the details about the hussy attempting to seduce him. _“Chinese girls these days only want money,”_ she’d pronounced. _“Don’t say I didn’t warn you when she gets pregnant and tries to rope you into a marriage. She’s using you, Yifan. I know this kind of girl when I see one.”_ His mother would never forgive him if she knew how close her words came to reality.

“Things are tough?” She laughed, and this time Kris couldn’t help but wince.

They stared at each other for a long moment while he waited for his punishment to come. Maybe he sounded lazy to her. He certainly could not tell her that he’d spent the half hour before she arrived so upset over Jia that he thought he would throw up, and even if he did tell her, she would never accept that as a valid reason. He was supposed to be strong.

But she didn’t yell the way he expected. She spoke calmly, rarely blinking, her words burrowing under his skin like thin splinters.

“Whatever you’re dealing with now is not ‘tough,’” she told him. “It may be unpleasant, but to call it ‘tough’ tells me that you have failed to understand a single thing I’ve ever taught you. Look at you. You look miserable. You look _weak_. You look this way when you have everything in front of you. Is this what I taught you to be?”

Her eyebrows lifted and he shook his head wordlessly in response.

“Of course not. ‘Tough’—bah. Things were tough when your father made a fool of himself and everything we had was repossessed by the government. Things were tough when my father threw us out to save face. Things were _tough_ when I didn’t know if I would be able to feed you your next meal. And not once—not _once_ —did I ever let myself drown in self-pity the way you are now. Hardship is a part of life, Yifan. Did you think things would just fall into your lap? That is not the hand fate has dealt you. You will have to fight for everything. Do you understand?”

He nodded, but couldn’t meet her eyes. In all of his childhood he could not remember one instance of her wallowing in self-pity, or even seeming sad. He only remembered the sharp, ruthless way she’d dealt with their poverty, and the lectures she gave him to hold his head up and look everyone in the eyes because he belonged to a better world than this one. If he cried, she slapped him and chided him for the weakness. He could not afford to be weak, she would tell him. Weakness was a luxury neither of them could afford.

“We were outcasts once. You remember. And I fought to bring us back where we belonged. I fought to be able to give you this much. Don’t you dare spit in my face and ruin this opportunity. I did not raise you to fail.”

Kris swallowed down the lump in his throat. Like he was walking along a cliff’s edge, failure always seemed so near, the fatal consequence of any one misstep he took. If he failed his mother or himself, he didn’t know how he could go on living. He could never manage to live up to Feifei—but he didn’t much have a choice. He had to try.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, choosing words he thought would satisfy her the most.

She watched him for a moment, then stepped forward and put her hands on her shoulders.

“You can do this,” she said, searching his eyes until he finally couldn’t hold his own, and he nodded obediently. Her eyes gleamed. “All you have to do is seize this opportunity. You have to fight for this, Yifan.”

For one brief moment, he pictured what would happen if he refused. But he couldn’t even imagine that. Refusing this was an impossibility. Slowly, he felt his own ambition ignite. He may not be Feifei, but he could take her place. He had to.

“I will,” he promised. His mother pulled him into a tight hug.

 

* * *

 

The domino effect often happened with things that had to do with Sehun—after that day which Sohee couldn’t remember without feeling so stupid, her own parents had called to say that _they_ were coming over, which was completely normal as her brother had come to her place that very day for this reason. Sohee was used to their parents dropping by now and then, but her mother wasn’t done: they were going to have dinner with the Ohs. All of them.

Sohee had blanked out for a while when her mother told her when the date was, and when she’d come back around the only thought in her head was to strangle Oh Sehun. Of course his mother would tell hers—they weren’t family friends for nothing. Her parents thought highly of the Oh brothers, but Sohee wanted to burrow in a hole and not come out for the rest of her life.

But she couldn’t, so here she was now in Sehun’s slightly more low-key Audi, glaring at his dashboard and wholeheartedly praying that her brother would go through the motions of the dinner without anyone getting their bones broken.

“Baby, did my dashboard offend you?” Sehun asked as he turned a corner. Sohee decided to glare at him instead. “Oh, _I_ did. Sorry about that.”

“You know, you’re being so offhanded about this that I highly doubt the authenticity of you being Korean right now.” Sohee scowled as they peeled past streets full of harried pedestrians. “Do you know that they think we’re on the verge of getting married?”

“That’s not a bad thing.” He replied very seriously and Sohee resisted the urge to smack him on the arm. “No I mean, they’re not going to think that. Come on, hyung has to get married first. Grandfather’s particular about hierarchy.”

“I hate you.” Sohee swore a little under her breath and Sehun laughed as they pulled up in front of the swanky restaurant in Koreatown that they were having dinner at. Sohee was still scowling as they walked into the lobby, and Sehun took her hand very nondescriptly when they were ushered in the elevator.

“I don’t _think_ so, baby.” He leaned into her and said rather suggestively as the elevator doors slid shut. Sohee looked up at him and punched him in the shoulder. Sehun made a face at her and she didn’t want to let out a defeated sigh, so she stared at the floor instead. Their inter-linked hands were in sight and Sohee was very reluctant to admit to herself that she didn’t want to let go.

The elevator dinged open and they were led to their private room by a server who seemed a bit too awestruck for Sohee’s liking. They were the first ones to arrive, and Sohee sank into the nearest chair as soon as the server left the room. Sehun stood behind her and started working very seriously on relaxing her shoulder muscles. It was a bit weird, for Sohee at least, that she wasn’t as annoyed as she should be, but she wanted to chalk it up to the fact that he seemed to know his way around shoulder massages.

“It’s not like you don’t know my parents.” Sehun pointed out suddenly, and Sohee frowned at the steaming cup of tea in front of her. “They love you.”

“They love my brother.” She replied matter-of-factly. “And the last time I saw them was when I was eighteen and not dating you.”

“Well, what an improvement now, isn’t it?” Sehun laughed and tried to squeeze her cheeks together. Sohee slapped his hands away before he could do much. He went back to the shoulder massage and Sohee closed her eyes, just to relax, she told herself. She was about to fall asleep when the door eased open with all the elegance of a well-mannered _chaebol_.

“Hi Mom.” She heard Sehun drawl from above her, and immediately shot up from her seat. Mrs. Oh was a classy, well-dressed lady, one of the type that Sohee saw often on her job appearances at various socialite events, but what put her apart from the rest of them was the real glow of motherliness in her eyes as she embraced Sehun, who was so much taller than her that she only reached up barely to the top of his arm.

“Hi Mom? You should learn how to look at your phone, son.” Mrs. Oh lectured as she pulled away, and Sehun had the cheek not to look abashed in the least. Sohee pulled on her Alexander Wang shirt and tried not to breathe too loudly like she did whenever she was nervous. Then Mrs. Oh turned to her. “And hello there, Sohee. I haven’t seen you in ages!”

Sohee nodded slightly and tried not to feel like an awkward plank of wood as Mrs. Oh gave her a hug. “It’s nice to see you, Mrs. Oh.”

“What Mrs. Oh? _Ajumma_ will do.” Mrs. Oh chided laughingly, and Sohee could see Sehun grin in her peripheral vision. If she could she’d smack that off his face. “Now that you’re dating our Sehun, anyway.”

Sohee hoped that her sharp intake of breath wasn’t too audible. Mrs. Oh was about to say something else, when the doors swung open again. There was a loud squeal of “Little Hyung!” and then Sehun was accosted by a boy, who immediately clung onto his neck and kicked his legs around. Sohee watched as Sehun let out a groan of pain. She wanted to say he deserved it, but they actually looked really cute. What was the world coming to?

“Seyun, hyung can’t bre—” Sehun gasped and pulled his younger brother off his neck. Seyun was still excitable, though, and was about to jump back on when his mother held him back. Sohee found it amazing that they had such a young kid in the house. She was the youngest for hers, and everyone seemed to have it in their heads that she was always going to be a six-year-old. Sehun had bent down to pick his brother up properly in the meantime, and turned to her with a huge grin. The two of them looked startlingly alike—Sohee was sure that Seyun was a good gauge for how Sehun looked like as a kid.

Sehun nudged Seyun with his chin, and he waved at her. “Hi Sohee nuna.”

“Hi, Seyun.” Sohee looked at Sehun, then back at Seyun, before waving a little awkwardly herself. “How are you?”

“I’m okay I think,” Seyun said and pulled at Sehun’s hair, who promptly did the same thing back with his other hand. “Mom says you and Little Hyung are boyfriend and girlfriend.”

Oh. So even the kid knew. Sohee glared at Sehun, who managed to somehow shrug while balancing the weight of a six year old on his right forearm. She was about to send more death glares Sehun’s way when Mrs. Oh called for order and for all of them to sit down. Sehun put Seyun down in the chair next to his, and patted the chair on his other side. Sohee kept her mouth firmly set in a line as she slid into the seat, and Sehun slipped his fingers in between hers again as Mrs. Oh read part of the menu she was reading aloud.

“You are so dead when we get home.” Sohee hissed as Mrs. Oh considered a dish that was promptly shot down by Seyun. Sehun made a kissy face at her and she swiped at him under the table.

“Your house or mine?” Sehun asked and Sohee really, really wanted to clamp his mouth shut. But then the doors opened again for the third time, and Sohee let out a massive groan internally as Minseok walked in with Segyun, his father, and their parents rounding up the back. Sehun looked at them, then back at her, and raised an eyebrow. “The line up’s complete, I see.”

“Be very, very careful around oppa.” She warned under her breath, and saw Minseok scowl in their direction. Beside him Segyun was watching them with amusement. It was weird for Sohee, because Sehun also looked very much like Segyun, and it was like having three doppelgangers grin at her from three different points in the room. Sohee felt like she was about to go insane, which wasn’t far from the truth. Oh Sehun had the ability to do that.

Their parents exchanged pleasantries, and Sohee stood up to hug her parents. Her father gave Sehun a very stern looking over, while her mother smiled kindly but mysteriously at the both of them, which was worse to Sohee, mainly because it was obvious that she was now already planning their wedding in fifteen different ways.

“Hi Sohee,” Segyun approached her cheerfully while Sehun was distracted with her mother, “it’s been a long time.”

“Hasn’t it, Segyun oppa?” Sohee smiled very resignedly, and Segyun patted her on the shoulder knowingly. He still looked supremely amused at the situation, though, and Sohee saw Minseok fold his arms next to their father. Her brother was such an angsty killjoy. “How’s everything?”

“Going smoothly.” Segyun leaned in and patted her on the head. “If you get what I mean.”

Sohee was about to ask him if he was talking about what she was thinking of, when Sehun slid in smoothly and held her hand again. “Yeah, hyung, I so do.”

Segyun shoved his hands into his pockets and gave his brother another amused look. Sohee wanted to throttle Sehun, but it wouldn’t be wise to murder him in front of so many people.

“Minseok’s watching.” Segyun said pleasantly before retreating to where Seyun was reading a book on dinosaurs very intently. Sohee turned to Sehun, who shrugged at her, when her mother called for her to sit back down at the table for dinner.

Their dishes arrived one after another, and Sohee swore she could see Minseok’s frown get deeper every time Sehun filled her bowl with a fair bit of the food. Her mother was smiling very graciously at them, though, and she was sure that her mom had probably already gotten to planning the twentieth type of wedding that they could possibly have.

“Shouldn’t Sohee be sitting next to you, Mom?” Minseok cleared his throat very loudly as Sohee reached to put a slice of meat on her mother’s plate. Sohee rarely expressed any sort of discontentment in the presence of her parents, so she merely gave Minseok a very tight-lipped smile. “Take the initiative, Sehun.”

“Manners, Minseok.” Mrs. Ahn said primly, and Sohee watched with a little vindictiveness as her brother shut up. If he were two decades younger she would have expected him to start picking moodily at his rice, but they were _chaebols_ , and _chaebols_ never played with their food. So instead Minseok was boring holes into Sehun with his eyes. Not exactly more mature, Sohee thought, but whatever. Her mother was her biggest shield.

“Have you heard of the Wangs, though?” Mr. Oh asked, once they were in the middle of their meal. He was a very tall, quiet man who looked like he would be a good fit for a Joseon scholar. Sohee wondered what had happened to Sehun along the way, since Segyun had managed to resemble their father in looks and disposition. “Big news.”

Mr. Ahn finished his cup of tea and nodded slowly. Sohee pricked her ears up—rarely did her father discuss anything business related in her presence, but if his friend and business associate was the one bringing it up, he couldn’t refuse to answer, could he? Out of the corner of her eye she could see Minseok’s disapproving face, before Segyun promptly pulled on his arm and whispered something into his ear.

“Huge.” Mr. Ahn let out something that sounded like a short laugh. “I actually liked the girl. More of a businessman than her old man ever was.”

Sohee wanted to ask who it was, but Sehun did it for her before she opened her mouth. “Who is it, Mr. Ahn?” He asked with all the air of an eager student. Minseok was staring potholes into Sehun’s chest by now. Segyun looked like he was enjoying the entire situation quite immensely.

“Interested in business now, Sehun?” Mr. Oh said, a tint of amusement to his tone, and Sehun merely nodded. “You know the Wangs, don’t you? The stepson went to school with your hyung. You might have seen him before.”

Sohee wondered if Sehun’s parents had really no idea of the kind of parties he was partial to, or just didn’t care all that much. But Sehun nodded again quite innocently, and Minseok looked like he was about to gag. Segyun was already grinning without a care in the world, while Seyun was still absorbed in his book, slowly chewing his rice as he read.

“Sehun knows who they are,” Segyun began, and everyone turned towards him. Minseok rolled his eyes, and their mother gave him a sharp look. “Kris’s older sister got disowned, baby bro.”

What? Sohee’s jaw almost dropped, had she not remembered to hold it together in front of her parents. “Wang Feifei got… disowned?” She asked in almost a whisper, and Segyun nodded like it was nothing. “Why?”

“The official reason is that she’s too busy with graduate school to fully cope with her work duties,” Minseok said, voice dripping with sarcasm, “but who knows? Kris’s been put on all of her projects now.”

“The stepson’s not… as innately talented.” Mr. Oh said delicately, and Sohee heard her father snort. “Isn’t he, Segyun?”

“Kris is—” Segyun hesitated and looked at Minseok, who only shrugged and crossed his arms in front of his chest. “He’s much more cautious than Wang Feifei.”

“Who needs cautiousness when it comes to forging new frontiers?” Her father waved a dismissive hand. “We worked with them because they were dangling China as their carrot. Wang Feifei seemed capable enough, really, but now that the boy’s been installed as heir, I’m not so sure anymore.”

“Kris isn’t as incapable as you think he is, Dad.” Minseok said, arms still crossed, “but I do think that our China expansion plans might slow down now. His stepfather isn’t going to give him complete rein over the company so soon, and since Wang Feifei was the one handling our project, we’re stuck.”

“Pity.” Mrs. Oh looked up from where she was talking to Seyun. Segyun nodded silently in agreement. “I thought that the Wangs were going to be good for our Chinese expansion too, given the girl’s engagement with Zhou Mi, but I guess that’s out of the window now, isn’t it? Weren’t they going to help put the Songs aside for you too, Minseok?”

Sohee’s head reeled from all the information she’d wanted to know for such a long time. They were coming in such large doses now that she was hardly able to process. But Wang Feifei had been disowned—did that mean that something had changed? If the Wangs were the center of the corruption like she and Sehun knew they were, then why were they throwing their heiress out now? Was she involved? Could, Sohee thought as the topic changed to some concurrent investment that the Ahns and Ohs were involved in, Feifei help them?

“Baby,” Sehun whispered in her ear and Sohee whipped around, startled, “if you keep zoning out like that, Minseok hyung’s going to get really suspicious.”

“Did you know about this?” Sohee asked under her breath as her brother turned his gaze away. Sehun shook his head and somehow she believed him. He hadn’t lied to her, not once at all, throughout the entire time that they had joined in this dating alliance, and Sohee was more inclined than not to place her full trust in Sehun.

“No, but we can make it work in our favour.” Sehun leaned in closer. Sohee listened. “If the Wangs are really the center of everything, the first thing Minseok hyung would want to do is distance your family from them. See, if he gives us the documents, we’ll release them anonymously and the job is done. _We_ can do this.”

Sohee frowned at her plate and felt him sneak his hand into hers again. She wasn’t sure of anything anymore, now that the Wangs seemed to be playing their hand so unpredictably, but she looked up at Sehun, who nodded at her like everything was going to be okay, and felt her heart beat at ease. Somewhere opposite them Minseok was bound to be extremely displeased again, but Sohee felt like she could actually not care for once. Sehun was hers—on her side—and by extension he could make everyone on his fall to her cause as well. Sehun was still looking at her, eyes determined, and she squeezed his hand once.

“Let’s make this work.” She mumbled under her breath and Sehun’s hand clutched hers a little tighter.

 

* * *

 

The article did not run.

As Feifei found out in a whispered, rushed phone call from Miranda, the owner of the newspaper was a friend of her father’s. He had only recently acquired the newspaper. Miranda had no idea. She only hoped she could keep her job.

The fire burning in Feifei the night she walked out of her father’s sight flickered.

Knowing that if she remained in the house in Los Angeles her father would make things very difficult for her, Feifei packed up her most important possessions. It was a very small number. Clothing, some books, a portrait of her mother, records of old Wang Corporation dealings kept on paper files in the house office. Probably not important, but Feifei gathered these up on autopilot, just in case. Otherwise, everything in the house was merely exorbitant excess.

She and Zhou Mi packed up the only car that did not belong to her father—it was her maternal grandfather’s, vintage and expensive—and drove in silence to the vineyard and ranch house Zhou Mi had bought a few hours north.

Feifei stared out the window. Her mind was blank. She felt nothing, watching the city disappear and then farmland roll by. It was as though she had slipped into someone else’s life.

Zhou Mi touched her arm gently when they reached the house. She stirred from semi-sleep and looked around. A Spanish-style villa. Zhou Mi always had excellent taste. She looked over and he smiled, clearly worried. Feifei got out of the car.

The house was sparsely furnished inside, and what was there was covered up with sheets. Zhou Mi uncovered a couch in the master bedroom and they sat in silence to eat the fast food they’d picked up on the way end, staring out the window at the peaceful vineyard below.

“Feifei?” Zhou Mi asked after a long time.

Something about the tone of his voice drew her up out of the deep water she’d sunk into. She looked at him, his concerned eyes and his steady, unquestioned presence. She knew she should talk to him, that he deserved at least that much from her. With a sigh, she looked back out the window again.

“This whole time I’ve been running toward one goal,” she said in a dark voice. “I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought that because I dared to do the right thing, fate would be on my side. But it wasn’t. I’ve failed.”

He might have said _you haven’t_ , but it would have been a shallow gesture of consolation. The facts were too obvious—they were in a house purchased as a contingency plan, Feifei was being scourged from every possible inch of the family business and inheritance, and the evidence she had given to Miranda was compromised. Her father would already be taking steps to cover the tracks of those documents. The documents themselves would disappear. Feifei and Zhou Mi were in retreat.

“What now?” Zhou Mi asked.

“I don’t know.”

He reached out for her hand and intertwined their fingers. It was a simple gesture. Feifei looked at their hands, wanting to take warmth from them, but she felt nothing. She felt nothing at all.

The sun began to set. He pulled on her hand and Feifei numbly responded to the gesture, moving over to rest her head on his shoulder. She took for granted that he was the only person she trusted, the only person in her life she could count on. Feifei needed little from others. She didn’t need their care or concern. But somehow she had his, and in some part of her calloused-over heart, she felt an inexpressible gratitude.

But even Zhou Mi could not follow her where she needed to go now. As the sun light turned long shadows over the countryside, the fire burning inside her took a breath of new life. Her father and all of his kind were guilty. She had thought fate was not on her side, but slowly she saw that it had set her free. Without the trappings of the Wang Corporation, she could go anywhere. Speak to anyone. People would talk to her who couldn’t before.

She sat up, her eyes on the burning orange sun resting low on the horizon. “It’s not over,” she said firmly. “I don’t stop here.”

“Feifei—”

“My father thinks I will crumble without his support,” she said quickly. “My stepmother thinks I am foolish and my stepbrother thinks he can beat me. Everyone else in that sick world thinks that they are above the law.”

She sat up on her knees, unable to suppress a smile from lighting on her face. They would all lay in ashes by the time she was through.

“But I’m not one of them anymore,” she announced. “Their rules mean nothing to me. I don’t have to beat them at their game—I have to play an entirely different game. Destroy them from underneath.”

Zhou Mi sat up tall and grabbed her face in his hands. Like this, his thumbs moving gently back and forth against her cheeks, he searched her eyes. She thought she saw fear reflected in his. But nothing would stop her, not now.

“Feifei,” he said, letting his hands slip away from her face. “You—you can’t. They won’t stop. The more you push them, the more eager they’ll be to crush you under their heel. If you flout the law, you only give them more reason to do the same.”

“You think I care?” Feifei laughed. “Victoria Song already threatened to have me murdered. You think I care? Would anything good in this world get done if people lived according to their fears?”

But rather than answer her, Zhou Mi became very pale. He blinked several times, his eyebrows creasing together.

“Victoria—you think Victoria threatened you?”

Feifei arched an eyebrow. “She admitted as much. She wanted me to know that she knew what I was attempting. That pig’s head was her theatrical warning.”

“She wouldn’t,” Zhou Mi insisted, his voice firm. “That’s not her. That’s not her at all.”

Feifei’s skin prickled. Zhou Mi stared hard at the floor, chewing at his lip, and the worst suspicion began itching in the back of her mind. As soon as she thought it, her stomach bottomed out. She couldn’t believe this.

“You told her,” she stated. “You told her and Han Geng.”

He didn’t meet her eyes. He didn’t speak.

Feifei stood up and walked over to the window, resting her arms on the windowsill. All the affection she’d felt for him minutes before washed away. Even Zhou Mi. Even him.

“You have to understand,” he said.

Feifei didn’t turn around.

“They’re my closest friends,” he said. “Feifei—listen to me. I _love_ you. I have loved you the best way I know how. But they are—I’ve known them since we were kids. They are the closest people in the world to me. They’re my family.”

“And what am I?” Feifei snapped, swinging around to look at him. “What the fuck am I, then? Isn’t your wife supposed to mean more than anyone?”

As soon as she said it she realized in a dim part of her mind that they weren’t married yet, and that her own eligibility had massively plummeted now that she was disowned. Zhou Mi might well abandon her—their marriage was a business dealing, after all. Their friendship and affection for each other was more like an accident, and clearly that was how Zhou Mi ranked it. Feifei below the people who really mattered to him. She hadn’t realized it would hurt this much.

“I have supported you this whole time,” Zhou Mi cried out. “From day one, I never told you to stop! I asked questions. I told you it was dangerous. But I have done every single damn thing you’ve asked me to. Can’t you carve out a _little_ space in your cold heart for some sympathy? You think I could know what was coming and not warn them?”

Feifei knew what he said was true, but spoke out of her blazing anger rather than her rational mind.

“I think you could, yes!” she yelled. “This isn’t a _game_. Haven’t you been telling me that this whole time? How could you tell them? You honestly think they would have any sympathy for _me_ just because you’re supposed to marry me?”

“How could I _not_ tell them?” Zhou Mi returned. “You want me to sit by and watch Victoria’s whole fortune get destroyed? Han Geng is destined for real political greatness, you want me to just wait in silence while they suffer?”

Feifei opened her mouth to yell something else in blind rage, but she stopped short.

“Han Geng is a good person, isn’t he?” she asked, suddenly calm.

Zhou Mi reeled in confusion. “He—what?”

“He’s a good person,” Feifei repeated. “Haven’t you been telling me that forever? ‘I can’t wait for you to meet Han Geng. What a great guy. He’s going to do such great things for this country.’ Haven’t you?”

“Yes, but I don’t get—”

“That’s it,” Feifei said. She smiled, suddenly calm. “Look—I’m pissed that you told them. But maybe it will be okay.”

Zhou Mi still couldn’t make sense of Feifei’s rapid reversal, and only gaped at her. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying,” Feifei said. “That whether you’re with me or not, I’m not done with this fight.”

They stood quietly for a moment, staring each other down. Outside the California night had nearly darkened the sky completely, and the stars had come out. She walked to the doors in front of the couch and flung them open, taking a deep breath of the cool night air. She could do anything now. Even finish the mission she’d set out on, however insane it was.

She was free.


End file.
